Maharashtra’s Swacch achievements

Navi Mumbai is the face of Maharashtra where Swacch Survekshan is concerned; it has been consistently ranked among the top five cleanest cities in India. However, Maharashtra has another reason to be proud of on this front. Its cities collectively bagged 92 awards in various categories, the highest by any state, in Swacch Survekshan-2021. Chhattisgarh was a distant second with 67 awards. 

Maharashtra has 55 cities with a one-star rating, 64 cities with a three-star rating and one city (Navi Mumbai) with a five-star rating. Of the 48 short-listed cities with a population of more than 10 lakh, ten were from Maharashtra. Of the 100 chosen cities with population between one and ten lakhs, 27 were from Maharashtra. In the 100 cities with less than one lakh residents, 56 were from Maharashtra, which shows the stress on cleanliness by the Urban Development Department. It also shows that citizens are becoming conscious of cleanliness and taking pride in their city.

Take for instance, Vita town in Sangli district. In the Swachh Survekshan Awards-2021, Vita was judged the cleanest Indian city with a population of under a lakh. The town segregates waste, composts the wet portion and gets good redemption value from the dry component. Segregated dry waste such as glass, clothes and plastic and paper are sorted by trained rag-pickers. Items like milk pouches and cement and fertilizer bags are processed in the plastic densifier to obtain briquettes that are further sold to plastic recyclers who process them into pipes and baskets.

Doctors and medical associations are actively in involved in Vita's quest to become the cleanest city. The Meat and Chicken Market Associations are also active in implementing the plastic ban.

 Lonavala and Saswad bagged the second and third spot after Vita. Lonavala has also received a 3-star rating in the category of waste-free city. The LMC collects segregated waste from all residential and commercial properties of the 12 wards with the help of 24 specially designed garbage-collection vehicles.

For the hotels and Residents Welfare Associations which generate more than 50 kg waste daily, it is compulsory to carry out on-site waste processing. 

There are some 32 community toilets and eight public toilets in Lonavala with 460 seating blocks, making it an open-defecation free city.

The LMC also carries out de-sludging of each septic tank once in every three years, besides using treated sewage water for irrigation purposes.

The civic body has installed water fountains in all wards and those are being run with treated water from sewage treatment plants.

All this goes to show that the objectives of the Swacch Maharashtra (urban) mission – to provide toilets for all and to abide by Solid Waste Disposal Rules, 2016 -- are being met.

Click the links below to visit UDD Social Media Platforms :

 Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/MAHAUDD

 Twitter: https://twitter.com/MAHA_UDD

 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/maha_udd/

 Blog: https://mahaudd.blogspot.com/

YouTube : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCe9-Tq8QTPQ4h8IyXp2wbvw