Imphal, May 4 (EMN): Gangtok, Aizawl and Imphal were listed as North East India’s first three cleanest cities, a nationwide cleanliness survey by the Union Ministry of Urban Development has found.
Gangtok ranked 50h (1414 score) while Aizawl (1222 score) and Imphal (1192 score) ranked 105 and 122 out of survey of 434 cities conducted as part of the Modi government’s Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, or Clean India Mission, according to 3rd edition of the Swachh Survekshan released on Thursday.
Nagaland’s state capital Kohima (970 score) which ranked 208, becomes the sixth cleanest city in NE region after Guwahati (1169 score) and Nagaon(1086 score). Imphal which was initially ranked 83 out of 500 selected cities of the country in 2015, has moved up to 15th in ranking for which the state was conferred with ‘Top Mover’ in North Eastern Region in 2016 survey wherein Gangtok and Aizawl were ranked 8th and 41st.
Guwahati, the premier city of the NE India which was ranked 50 in 2016, is ranked 134 this time and becomes the fourth cleanest city in the region and it was followed by Nagaon(Assam) which ranked 161, Kohima(Nagaland) 208, Itanagar(Arunachal Pradesh) 216, Shillong(Meghalaya) 276, Agartala(Tripura) 290 and Dibrugarh (Assam) 297.In 2016, Agartala was ranked 33,Shillong 53rd and Itanagar 71st while Nagaon,Kohima and Dibrugarh were not listed that time.
Cities were evaluated on five parameters – waste collection, solid-waste management, construction of toilets, sanitation strategies and behaviour change communication. The rankings are based on the data provided by municipal corporations, independent assessors and feedback from people. In all, 3.7 million citizens participated in the exercise.
The cleanliness survey was carried out during January and February. Launched in 2014, the Swachh Bharat campaign aims to make India clean and open-defecation free by 2019, the 150th birth anniversary year of Mahatma Gandhi.
Though there cannot be absolute comparison between the rankings of 2016 and for 2017 since the parameters have been tweaked, it’s evident from the results that state capitals and towns like Aizawl, Kohima, Nagaon and Dibrugarh, have improved their rankings.
