The Swachh Survekshan results, released on May 4, mirror a grim face of the Northeast region as the cities here failed to make a mark in the cleanliness survey.
Sikkim’s capital Gangtok secured the highest 50th position while Aizawl was placed at 105th. The largest city in the region, Guwahati, was placed at a distant 134th position in the cleanliness survey.
Besides Guwahati, Assam’s other towns also earned poor marks with Dibrugarh being the lowest in the region at the 297th position. Nagaon is placed at 161st and Silchar at 280th.
Imphal’s performance was slightly better with 122nd position while Kohima and Dimapur fared poorly at 208th and 277th position.
Itanagar too couldn’t fare better with 216th position in the rankings. Agartala was at 290th place.
Swachh Survekshan-2017 was aimed at capturing the outcomes on ground of the ongoing efforts to make urban areas ‘open defecation free’ and to improve door-to-door collection, processing and disposal of municipal solid waste. Of the total score of 2,000, 900 marks were assigned for performance in respect of ODF and solid waste management, 600 marks for citizen feedback and 500 marks for independent observation.
M Angamuthu, deputy commissioner of Kamrup metro district said that Guwahati could have done much better. “It’s unfortunate. But I’m optimistic. There are plenty of scopes Guwahati can excel. We need to focus at the community participation. Among others, our focus will be at the public toilets. Learning from our experiences we will have to work for better performance in the days to come,” said Angamuthu.
Indore has emerged as the India’s cleanest city in the survey. Besides, Bhopal, Visakhapatnam, Surat, Mysuru, Tiruchirapally, New Delhi Municipal Council, Navi Mumbai, Vadodara and Chandigarh are among the Top 10 clean cities in that order.
While, Gonda in Uttar Pradesh placed at the bottom of the list.
