New Delhi, Oct 1 (PTI) Erstwhile North Delhi Municipal Corporation has finished in bottom 10 among 45 cities of the country which were surveyed under a certain category of the government's cleanliness survey, according to data shared on a website linked with Swachh Bharat Mission.

In the 2022 survey, the North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) was ranked 37th, East Corporation 34th, and the South Corporation was placed at 28th rank, according to information available on the Swachh Survekshan 2022 dashboard on "http:bmurban.org"

Also Read | Congress President Election: Fail To Understand Why G-23 Leaders Who Wanted Polls Are Now Backing Off, Says Shashi Tharoor.

All three municipal corporations in Delhi were unified into a new entity -- Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) in May 2022.

Cities in the National Capital Region like Faridabad stood at 36, as per the dashboard.

Also Read | Jaipur Shocker: Bikers Throw Acid on Two Girls in Separate Incidents, Minor Burn Suffered; Probe Underway.

Indore was adjudged India's cleanest city for a sixth time in a row, followed by Surat and Navi Mumbai. The survey also declared Madhya Pradesh as the "best performing state."

The three municipal corporations in Delhi came in the category of cities with a population of over 10 lakh.

In a previous survey of 48 cities in the same category, the three corporations were ranked thus -- NDMC (45), EDMC (40), and SDMC (31).

A senior MCD official said, “We are pleased to see the civic bodies climbing stairs, and all three have moved up in ranking this year. SDMC particularly has brought the corporation into the top 30, from its position on the edge of 30 last year.”

"Various initiatives taken by the three corporations until they merged into one MCD, particularly by the SDMC, have paid off. And, next year, we would like to see ourselves among the top contenders," he said.

MCD later in a statement insisted on the improvement in rank by the former three corporations and attributed it to several of its initiatives.

“The erstwhile corporations had taken various new Swachh initiatives to improve the rankings. Swachh Initiatives like setting up of decentralised compost plant, special drives for ensuring and maintaining ODF++ status, remediation of landfill sites, installation of twin dustbin to promote segregation of the waste, setting up of garbage cafe, 'bartan bank', 'Thaila bank', eco hub, etc.”

It said that now after the unification of MCD, special emphasis will be given to improve the cleanliness of public toilets, citizen grievance redressal, cleanliness of roads, cleanliness of drains, certification parameters, and implementing door-to-door segregation of municipal waste.

It will also give special emphasis on strengthening its waste processing capacity as well as rate of processing waste, the civic body said.

MCD has already declared 59 colonies that come under it “garbage-free”.

Now, it is monitoring all indicators of Swach Sarvekshan 2023 on a monthly basis and trying its best to achieve top rankings next year, the official said.

Patna has been ranked 38th followed by Ranchi at 39th position in this category across 45 cities which participated in the exercise.

In 2019, the EDMC was certified 'Open Defecation Free' and in 2020, it had achieved 'ODF+' status.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)