The Swachh Surveskshan was carried out by the government of India to find out the progress of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Swachh Bharat Abhiyan across India. Even though in 2017 this survey assessed only 434 cities, the list has opened the eyes of a lot of cities to better their hygiene (especially Uttar Pradesh whose 5 cities have made it to the list of the 10 dirtiest cities).

Ganga River

Each city was ranked on the basis of its sanitation, open defecation status, solid waste management and citizen feedback. Out of a total mark of 2000 marks, a 45% weightage (900 marks) was given to Solid Waste Management including Door-to-Door collection, processing and disposal, citizen feedback consisted of 30% weightage (600 marks) and Independent observations was given a 25% weightage (500 marks).

From having a lower rank in 2016, Indore (Madhya Pradesh) geared up its hygiene game and bagged the first position to be the cleanest city in India. Even Bhopal, Vishakapatnam, Surat, Tirupati and Vadodara have improved their sanitation a lot. It was noted that Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh have some of the cleanest cities in the country.

Alarmingly, 50 out of 62 cities/towns in Uttar Pradesh have been ranked 305 and below in the list. Gonda, which is the district headquarter and administrative centre for the Devipatan Division in UP has topped the list to be the dirtiest city in the country. Hardoi, Bahraich, Shahjahanpur and Khurja are the other cities from UP which made it to the list by being placed 4th, 6th, 9th and 10th dirtiest city in the country. 41 cities of UP are in the bottom 100 and their only saving grace is Varanasi which is at 32. 

Maharashtra’s Bhusawai comes second last in the list but the other cities in this state fared much better.

Bihar’s Bagaha and Kaithar are on number 3 and 5 for the filthiest cities.

Two cities in Punjab, namely Muktsar and Abohar are ranked 7th and 8th as in the list of unclean cities as well.

17,500 locations had spot assessment done on them by the 421 assessors. The places were regularly monitored as well. It was seen that after the list in 2016 was released, there had been quite some changes made by the cities like Dhanbad and Jharkhand which were the dirtiest cities of that year. This campaign for cleanliness in our country was undertaken by our Prime Minister in 2014 and the survey was done to keep an eye on whether the campaign was being taken seriously or not. It is indeed an efficient way to check the progress and increase awareness and hygiene. It is our country and our duty to keep it clean, and none of us would really like our city/town’s name to be disgraced by being called the dirtiest.