Swachh Survekshan 2018: Looking forward to cleaner India where each citizen plays his/her part: Hardeep Puri

Jan 04,2018

Shri Hardeep Puri, Minister of State(I/C) for Housing & Urban Affairs has informed that the focus of Swachh Survekshan 2018 been shifted from process and output based indicators to indicators focusing on outcome and sustainability.  Providing details of the Swachh Survekshan 2018 launched today, Shri Puri stated that Swachh Survekshan has served as the agent of change demonstrating massive potential of addressing challenges through unique interventions in urban governance.  With the roll out of Swachh Survekshan 2018, we look forward to a cleaner India, where each Indian citizen has played his/her part in the Nation’s transformation, he added.  He was speaking at a Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs programme, this morning.  Sh Durga Shankar Mishra, Secretary and Shri V.K.Jindal, Mission Director for SBM-U were also present.

Providing details of the Swachh Survekshan 2018, the Minister informed that this is the largest survey impacting more than 40 crore urban population and to ensure level playing field in similar smaller cities, Swachh Survekshan 2018 will have two categories of ranking-

1)      500 cities with more than 1 lakh population will have National Ranking

2)      3541 cities with less than 1 lakh population will have State and Regional ranking.

The survey attempts to capture the progress in following 6 broad parameters –

1.      Collection and Transportation of Municipal Solid Waste: to ensure that segregated dry and wet waste is collected daily from the households and our public areas are clean.

2.      Processing and Disposal of Municipal Solid Waste: to encourage cities to process their waste and wherever possible recycle the dry waste.

3.      Sanitation related progress: to verify whether city is ODF with access to toilet available for citizens.  This year even all Petrol Pumps of the country are coming forward to offer their toilets as Public Toilets.

4.      IEC (Information, Education and Communication): Whether cities have started campaigns promoting Swachh Survekshan, engaging citizens in waste management, maintenance of Community and Public Toilets etc.

5.      Capacity Building: to assess whether officials in the ULBs were provided sufficient opportunities to attend trainings and go for exposure visits.

6.      Innovation and Best Practices: This component has been introduced first time in this survey – encourage cities to come forward and share their best practices in Swachh Bharat Mission.  It will help the country to learn how our cities have responded the call for Make India Clean and ODF by October 2019.

 In October, 2015, the Swachh Bharat Mission team in the Ministry conceptualized and introduced a healthy competition ‘Swachh Survekshan’ among cities to improve the status of urban sanitation in India. 

 -       Swachh Survekshan-2016 conducted in January, 2016 assessing 73 Urban Local Bodies.  Mysuru got the tag of Cleanest City of India.

 -       Swachh Survekshan-2017 was conducted in January-February 2017 covering 434 ULBs.  Indore emerged as the Cleanest City of India.

           During declaration of the Swachh Survekshan-2017 results on 4th May, 2017, it was announced that all 4041 cities will be part of Swachh Survekshan-2018 to be conducted from January to March, 2018. 

 The methodology of the survey focuses on collection of data from 3 sources
 

1.      Service Level Progress:  This will carry 35% weightage in the survey, where ULB’s documents are physically verified to assess whether systems and processes are in place to implement Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban) in the most efficient way.

 2.      Direct Observation: will have 30% weightage to observe and ascertain general cleanliness in the cities by making random field visits in different parts of the city and public conveniences covering Community/Public Toilets.

 3.      Citizens Feedback:  has been given 35% weightage to diagnose the experience of the citizens – city’s pulse is checked by collecting citizens response against 6 specific questions covering issues around general cleanliness and sanitation related progress made by the city.  SwachhataApp, a grievance mechanism tool handed over to citizens also contributes in indicating the efforts made by the cities in resolving the issues raised by the citizens.  Till date more than 49 lakh citizens have downloaded the App.