Indore bags cleanest city award for sixth year, M.P ranks first among States

Context

Indore was recently awarded the cleanest city in India for the sixth year in a row and Madhya Pradesh awarded the cleanest state in the country.

About Swachh Survekshan

• It is an annual survey of cleanliness, hygiene and sanitation in cities and towns across India, launched as part of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan (specifically under SBA-Urban).
• It was launched by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) with Quality Council of India (QCI) as its implementation partner.
• The SBA was launched (on 2nd October 2014) to make India clean and free of open defecation by 2nd October 2019.
• The SBA was split into two - rural (SBA-Gramin, monitored by the Department of Drinking Water and Sanitation under the Ministry of Jal Shakti) and urban (SBA-Urban, overseen by the MoHUA).
• SBM-U 2.0 was recently launched on 1st October, 2021, focused on ensuring complete access to sanitation facilities for all.
• The vision of a Garbage Free India is an initiative under SBM-U 2.0.
• The first survey was undertaken in 2016 (covering 73 cities), which had grown to cover 4242 (by the 2020 survey).

Key-highlights

• In the State awards
• Madhya Pradesh was named the Cleanest State in the category of "more than 100 Urban Local Bodies," displacing Chhattisgarh, the previous three years' cleanest state, to second place. 
• Maharashtra was named the third cleanest state.
• Similarly, Tripura won the cleanest State award in the "less than 100 urban local bodies category," unseating Jharkhand, which had won the previous two years in a row.
• Jharkhand and Uttarakhand finished second and third, respectively.
• Swachh Survekshan Gramin
• Telangana won the first prize under the Large States category under Swachh Survekshan Gramin (SSG) 2022 which looked into the sanitation status of rural areas, Haryana was adjudged the second and Tamil Nadu the third. 
• The Swachh Survekshan Gramin-2022 award ranks States and districts on the basis of their performance attained on key quantitative and qualitative Swachh Bharat Mission Gramin (SBM-G) parameters and engagement of the rural community in the improvement of their sanitation status. 
• Among the smaller States and Union territories, Andaman and Nicobar secured the first position followed by Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu and Sikkim.
• Winners in other categories
• Indore strengthened its position by becoming India's first 7-star Garbage Free city, while Surat, Bhopal, Mysuru, Navi Mumbai, Vishakhapatnam, and Tirupati received 5-star Garbage Free designations.
• Tirupati was named the best city in the Safai Mitra Suraksha category, while Haridwar in Uttarakhand was named the best Ganga town among cities with more than one lakh inhabitants.
• Shivamogga in Karnataka was named a fast-moving city.