Sindhudurg, Mandi cleanest districts: survey

New Delhi, Sep 8: Maharashtra's Sindhudurg is the cleanest among 53 well-performing districts in plains while Himachal Pradesh's Mandi tops the list of 22 in the hills, according to a Swachh survey in rural areas this year.

The top 10 cleanest districts in plains as per the Quality Council of India (QCI) survey, whose findings were released by Union Rural Development Minister Narendra Singh Tomar here, are Satara, Kolhapur, Ratnagiri and Thane in Maharashtra; Nadia, Midnapur East and Hoogly in West Bengal; Udupi in Karnataka and Churu in Rajasthan.

From the hilly regions, Shimla, Hamirpur, Kullu and Chamba in Himachal Pradesh; West Sikkim, East Sikkim, South Sikkim and North Sikkim in Sikkim and Mizoram's Champhai districts have made it to the top 10 cleanest districts.

The survey puts Bikaner, Ajmer, Pali and Dungarpur in Rajasthan; Ahmedabad, Anand and Panchmahal in Gujarat; Gadag in Karnataka; Sirsa in Haryana and Perambaluru in Tamil Nadu at the bottom of the list relating to districts in plains.

On the other hand, Anjaw, Papum Pare, Changlang, West Siang and West Kameng in Arunachal Pradesh; Jaintia Hills, East Garo Hills and Ri Bhoi in Meghalaya; Bongaigaon in Assam and Lahul and Spiti in Himachal Pradesh are ranked at the bottom of the list of districts from hilly belt in North-East and Special Category.

Tomar-led Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation, which got the survey conducted during May and June this year, though maintained that the districts placed at the bottom of the list were not "worst performing".

"Ever since the survey was launched nearly two years ago, we had identified 75 better performing districts as far as the Swachh Bharat campaign is considered. So, we carried out a third party field survey of these districts to see the reality this year.

"So, these are not badly performing districts. It is just that some of the well performing districts are doing better than others," a Ministry official said.

The QCI surveyed 70,000 households before ranking them. It studied more than 1,050 households in plain regions, while in hilly areas, over 350 households were inspected, a report said.

The survey on sanitation was conducted based on four parameters: percentage of households having access to safe toilets and their usage (40 per cent weightage), households having no litter around (30 per cent); average score of cleanliness (out of 100) around public places (20 per cent) and households having no wastewater around (10 per cent), officials said.

"During the survey we went beyond the only parameter of construction of toilets and their use. The survey was comprehensive with other parameters included. We hope the cleanliness ranking will have positive impact in strengthening the campaign," Tomar told reporters.

PTI