Mysuru has earned the 'Cleanest Medium City' tag in the latest Swachh Bharat rankings. Minister for Housing and Urban Affairs Hardeep Puri made the announcement on Wednesday while declaring the results of the Swachh Sarvekshan 2018 undertaken between January 4 and March 10.
"The Swachh Sarvekshan 2018 assessed 4,203 urban local bodies, impacting around 40 crore citizens across the length and breadth of the country, through 2,700 assessors. The survey was organised by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, under the aegis of the Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban)," Puri said.
Mysuru had bagged the cleanest city in the country tag for two consecutive years in 2015 and 2016. However, it was dethroned and slipped to the fifth position in 2017.
It was reported last year that the Mysuru City Corporation (MCC) was leaving no stone unturned to put the city on top of list of cleanest cities once again in 2018. The civic agency worked on raising awareness among its residents and encouraged public participation in the survey, which gave 35% weightage to citizen feedback.
The top three cleanest cities in the Swachh Survekshan 2018 at the national level are Indore, Bhopal, Chandigarh.
Cities having a population of 1 lakh and more and capital cities were ranked at the national level and cities with a population of less than 1 lakh were ranked at the zonal level – north, south, east, west and northeast. Based on the performance in Swachh Survekshan, 2018, the government has been decided to confer awards to 29 cities/cantonment boards at the national level, 20 cities at the zonal level and 3 states having the best performance in urban areas.
Andhra Pradesh's Vijayawada was India's cleanest big city, while the fastest mover big city tag was given to Uttar Pradesh's Ghaziabad, which has come up to 32nd rank from 356.
The tag of India's best city with regards to citizens feedback was given to Kota in Rajasthan, best city in innovation and best practices was given to to Nagpur in Maharashtra, best city in solid waste management to Navi Mumbai in Maharashtra, cleanest medium city to Mysuru in Karnataka and cleanest small city to the New Delhi Municipal Council area.
Delhi got India's cleanest cantonment tag in the survey, followed by Almora, Ranikhet and Nainital in Uttarakhand, St Thomas Mount Cantt. in Chennai (Tamil Nadu) and Jutogh Cantt., Shimla (Himachal Pradesh).
Jharkhand was chosen as the best performing state, followed by Maharashtra and Chhattisgarh.