Swachh Survekshan Awards 2025-26 Results Announcement
President of India Smt. Droupadi Murmu honored India's cleanest cities at the Swachh Survekshan Awards 2025-26 ceremony held at Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi, convened by the Department of Urban Development, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs. The awards were presented in the presence of Union Minister for MoHUA & Power Sh. Manohar Lal and Minister of State for MoHUA Shri Tokhan Sahu. This year's survey included 60 national awards across 5 categories: Swachh Shehar Jodi, Clean Cities of Super Swachh League, Swachh Shehar in 5 population categories, Swachh River Front Town, Swachh Coastal Town, Clean Himalayan City, and State First Swachh City.
Award Winners and Category Performance
The top 3 ranked cities in the Swachh Shehar Jodi category were Ahmedabad (Mentor) - Sanand (Mentee), Indore (Mentor) - Depalpur (Mentee), and Tirupati (Mentor) - Kuppam (Mentee), recognized for accelerating urban waste management excellence through collaborative efforts. In the Clean Cities of Super Swachh League category, Navi Mumbai, Surat, and Vijayawada emerged as the top 3 performers. For million-plus population cities, GVMC Visakhapatnam, Jabalpur, and Lucknow were declared India's top 3 Swachh Shehar.
This year marked the first-time inclusion of special categories: Swachh River Front Town, Swachh Coastal Town, and Clean Himalayan City. The top 3 Clean Himalayan Cities were Rudrapur (Uttarakhand), Jammu, and Shopian (J&K). For Swachh River Front Town, Rewa (MP), Bilaspur (Chhattisgarh), and Varanasi (UP) received top honors. The Swachh Coastal Town awards went to Puri (Odisha), Alappuzha (Kerala), and Ratnagiri (Maharashtra).
Performance Metrics and Survey Scale
Swachh Survekshan 2025-26 demonstrated significant improvements across urban India, with over 350 Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) jumping more than 500 ranks compared to previous assessments. Smaller cities particularly excelled, with 1,700+ ULBs having populations under 50,000 improving their rankings over 2024-25. The survey scale has expanded dramatically from 73 cities in 2016 to 4,751 cities in 2025-26, with 2.70 crore citizens providing feedback during this year's assessment.
Program Achievements and Initiatives
Union Minister Shri Manohar Lal highlighted the transformation achieved since 2014, noting that urban waste processing has increased from 16% to 80%, while door-to-door waste collection coverage has risen from 44% to over 96%. The remediation of legacy waste dumpsites has freed nearly 11,000 acres of urban land for productive use. The Swachh Shehar Jodi initiative paired 70 mentor cities with 191 mentee cities to facilitate knowledge-sharing and improve sanitation outcomes.
Additional participation metrics included nearly 2.10 crore citizens in Swachhata Hi Seva 2026, benefits extended to around 17 lakh SafaiMitras through over 33,000 special camps, and participation of nearly 4 lakh children in Gyan Yatras. The PRAGATI-50 initiative was announced to develop 50 cities as Model Clean Cities through technology-driven interventions and continuous monitoring.
Assessment Methodology
Urban Local Bodies were assessed across 43 indicators covering 10 critical domains: 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, and Citizen Feedback & Grievance Redressal. Over 3,000 trained assessors conducted extensive on-ground evaluations nationwide with real-time GPS-enabled monitoring, using a fully digital, transparent assessment framework.