Mumbai's swachh rank slips by 29 spots

Mumbai: Looks like maximum city’s cleanliness claims have gone for a toss. Despite undertaking various cleanliness initiatives, Mumbai’s rank slipped to 29th position in the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan contest held last year.

To improve its scores, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has decided to create public awareness among Mumbaikars about cleanliness. BMC’s plans to improve city’s clean image had suffered a rude jolt last year when Mumbai had slipped to 29th position in the ‘Swachh Sarvekshan 2017’ from its 10th rank earlier.

According to survey findings, Mumbai managed an overall score of 1,535, with marks of self-declaration (823), citizen feedback (299) and independent observation (413). This was too low as compared to the scores of top three cities — Indore (1,808), Bhopal (1,800) and Visakhapatnam (1,797). In the first cleanliness survey conducted in 2014, Mumbai was ranked as low as 147. But two years later it jumped up to the 10th rank in 2016. The city was also awarded as the ‘Best performer’ among mega cities.

The results of this year’s Abhiyan will be announced in the month of May. “The BMC has roped in actor Akshay Kumar to promote the message of cleanliness among Mumbaikars,” said a senior civic official.

“We are encouraging people to download the Swachhata-MoHUA app on their phones and post cleanliness-related issues on them,” said Kiran Dighavkar, BMC’s nodal officer for Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.