CHANDIGARH: In the Swachh Survekshan 2018 rankings, Punjab has emerged as number one state in the North Zone. It has also improved its rank among cleanest states and has jumped to the ninth position.
Though the ranking of cleanest cities was released by the government last month, the full report was released by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Indore on Saturday.
Not only this, 42 cities from Punjab figure in top 100 of the 1,008 cities in the North Zone, which indicates the changing attitude towards sanitation and cleanliness.
Navjot Singh Sidhu, state’s Local Government Minister, congratulated Principal Secretary A Venu Prasad, Swachh Bharat Mission Director Ajoy Sharma and the entire team of the state for the achievement. He also congratulated the residents of Punjab for making remarkable progress in keeping cities clean and observing high standards of sanitation.
Out of the four zonal award categories, two cities of Punjab, Bhadson and Moonak, bagged cleanest city and best city in citizen feedback award, respectively, in the North Zone.
In 2017, 16 cities from Punjab had participated and 7 figured in bottom 100. This time, only one city was ranked among the last 100 out of total 485 bigger cities surveyed. Last year, Mohali was the best performing city from Punjab and was ranked 121. This year, the city moved up to 109th position while Panchkula ranked 142.
Prasad said the whole Swachh Bharat Team of Punjab has worked really hard and turned the tide in Swachh Survekshan 2018. He reiterated that Swachhta teams would continue to work hard and give priority to solid waste management and ‘Waste to Wealth’ approach by adopting best practices from other progressive states in the field of sanitation.