Swachh Survekshan report 2017

Why in news?

Indore in Madhya Pradesh has been ranked India’s cleanest city in the Swachh Survekshan survey released by the government.

What is Swachh Survekshan?

• Swachh Survekshan is a ranking exercise to assess rural and urban areas for their levels of cleanliness and active implementation of Swachhata mission initiatives in a timely and innovative manner.
• The objective of the survey is to encourage large scale citizen participation and create awareness amongst all sections of society about the importance of working together towards making towns and cities a better place to live in.
• The survey also intends to foster a spirit of healthy competition among towns and cities to improve their service delivery to citizens, towards creating cleaner cities and towns.
• The Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India takes up the Swachh Survekshan in urban areas and the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation in rural areas.
• The Quality Council of India (QCI) has been commissioned the responsibility of carrying out the assessment.

How cities are ranked?

• The cities surveyed were ranked on criteria which included solid waste management, open defecation-free status, citizen participation and independent observation.
• According to the government, these 434 cities and towns were the survey has been conducted account for 60% of the country’s urban population.
• They were assessed on a total of 2000 marks.

What are the key findings of the report?

• Results of 2017 survey confirmed that a major transformation in respect of sanitation is taking place in Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.
• There is 80% improvement in cleanliness in cities and towns over the last year.
• Sanitation-related infrastructure and services like waste collection and processing have also improved.
• Last year, Mysore, which topped the survey last year, has been ranked fifth this year.
• Mysore continues to score over 87%. This shows that there is no decline in sanitation levels from last year but other cities have scored better.
• Faridabad in Haryana has been ranked as the fastest moving city, securing an overall rank of 88, an improvement from 2016 where it was in the bottom one-third.
• Varanasi, has improved to rank 32 this year from 418 in 2014.

What is the status of Delhi?

• New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) was ranked 7 out of 434 cities surveyed. Last year, it was ranked 4 out of 73 cities.
• Despite being declared “open defecation-free” by the Urban Development Ministry and seeing the launch of several initiatives to improve solid waste management, the NDMC saw its rank dipping.
• NDMC had been adjudged the best in the “North Zone” in the Swachh Survekshan.

Top 5 cities

Source: The Hindu, Live mint