New Delhi [India], November 9 (ANI): President Droupadi Murmu will confer Swachh Survekshan Awards 2025-26 at a ceremony to be held at Vigyan Bhawan in the national capital on November 11.
According to a press release by the Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs, the 10th edition of Swachh Survekshan on the theme of ‘Swachhata Ki Nayi Pehel- Badhayein Haath, Karein Safai Saath’ has been successfully completed. Under the aegis of the Department of Urban Development, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, Swachh Survekshan (SS) Awards 2025-26 will honour India’s cleanest cities, celebrating their outstanding contributions to Swachh Bharat Mission-Urban.
The President of India, Droupadi Murmu, will confer awards across various categories at Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi, in the presence of Manohar Lal, Union Minister of MoHUA and Power and Tokhan Sahu, Minister of State, MoHUA.
The SS 2025-26 awards serve as a celebration of the collective achievements of cities and States in the past decade and a renewed commitment to sustain on-ground achievements.
Swachh Survekshan, SBM-U’s flagship cleanliness assessment, has grown in scale from 73 ULBs in 2016 to over 4,751 cities in its latest edition. Swachh Survekshan 2025-26 introduces several key enhancements, including greater emphasis on citizen feedback, expanded coverage of Urban River Fronts, Coastlines and Water bodies and focused indicators on prevention of open defecation & open urination, cleanliness of tourist and heritage hotspots, and behaviour change initiatives in schools.
As part of the 10th edition of SS, Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) were evaluated across 43 indicators spanning 10 key assessment areas – Segregation, Collection & Transportation of Waste, Solid Waste Management, Visible Cleanliness, Access to Sanitation, Mechanisation of Desludging Services, Ecosystem Strengthening & Institutional Parameters, Used Water Management, Advocacy for Swachhata, Overall Welfare of Sanitation Workers & Citizen Feedback & Grievance Redressal.
More than 3,000 trained assessors conducted extensive on-ground evaluations across the country, supported by real-time GPS-enabled monitoring. From evidence submission to verification, the assessment process remained fully digital, transparent, and subject to rigorous quality checks at every stage.
Alongside the top Swachh cities, this year’s awards also recognise top performers from the ‘Swachh Shehar Jodi’ initiative that has fostered peer learning between 70 mentor cities and 191 mentee cities across 33 States/UTs to accelerate urban waste management excellence.
The ‘Swachh Shehar Jodi’ Initiative was launched by Manohar Lal, Union Minister, on September 27, 2025 as the first-ever urban waste management mentorship and peer-learning programme. At the launch event, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed to commence this initiative between all mentor and mentee cities.
The performance of mentee cities has witnessed significant improvement across key Swachhata indicators between Swachh Survekshan 2024 and 2025. Notable improvements across mentee city performances have been recorded in the latest edition of Swachh Survekshan 2025-26. In the parameter of ‘Visible Cleanliness ’, mentee cities have moved from 48% in SS 2024 to 70% in the latest edition. For ‘Door-to-Door Collection’, mentee cities were at 52% in SS 2024 and have now cumulatively reached 74%.
Mentee cities have also achieved notable improvements across key parameters such as: Source Segregation (from 16% to 30%), Access to Sanitation (from 11% to 38%), Used Water Management (from 32% to 53%), and Advocacy for Swachhata (from 48% to 66%), reflecting strengthened sanitation systems and improved service delivery outcomes through dedicated mentorship from high-performing cities.
Following a year of dedicated efforts, healthy competition, and steadfast commitment to Swachhata, cities across the country now eagerly await the announcement of the Swachh Survekshan 2025-26 Award winners on 11 November, 2026. (ANI)
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