Mysuru in Karnataka has topped the list of the cleanest city in the country while Dhanbad in Jharkhand has been ranked as the dirtiest, being at the bottom of 73 major cities surveyed for sanitation scenario by the Urban Development Ministry.
Incidentally, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Parliamentary constituency Varanasi too could not make to top clean cities and in fact was among the bottom ten cities.
While Chandigarh came second, Tiruchirapalli stood third in the ‘Clean India’ race, the national Capital Delhi, which earned the fourth, according to the Swachchh Survekshan 2016 which was announced on Monday by Urban Development Minister Venkaiah Naidu at a Press conference.
Other cities that have made to the first ten clean city list are Visakhapatnam, Surat, Rajkot, Gangtok, Pimpri Chindwad and Greater Mumbai. In fact, the first four cities improved their ranks to break into top 10 clean cities in this year’s survey when compared to last year’s survey conducted before the launch of the Swachchh Bharat Mission (SBM) in 2014.
The bottom 10 cities are Kalyan Dombivili in Maharshtra, Varanasi, Jamshedpur, Ghaziabad, Raipur, Meerut, Patna, Itanagar, Asansol and Dhanbad which ranked 73.
Fifty-three cities with a population of above ten lakh each and 22 Capitals with lesser population were selected for the survey to assess the impact of SBM. NOIDA and Kolkata had desired to participate in the next round of survey.
last cleanliness survey was conducted in 2014 among 476 cities with a population of one lakh and above each and results were announced last year.
From the results of 2014 survey which was based on a large number of parameters, 476 cities were ranked based on their performance with regard to the components of SBM like construction of toilets, solid waste management and independent observation. This enabled comparison of results of both the surveys for assessing the impact of the Mission.
The 73 cities surveyed this year were also ranked based on the marks they scored in 2014 for further comparison with the results of this year’s survey.
Naidu stated that of the 73 cities surveyed, 32 have improved ranks since the last survey, including 17 from the North, six from the West, five from the South and two each from the East and North-East.
He said, “This is a clear evidence of enhanced efforts being made by the northern cities towards sanitation and new cities challenging the domination of cities from the South and the West among top clean cities.”
Based on the comparison of the marks and ranks of the two surveys, Naidu said the SBM has made a positive impact on urban areas in terms of enhanced efforts to improve sanitation, reorientation of attitudes of urban local bodies and citizens and improvement on ground.