President Droupadi Murmu presented the Swachh Survekshan Awards 2025-26 at a ceremony held at Vigyan Bhawan in New Delhi to Nabi Mumbai. The city has been recognised as India’s cleanest city in the Swachh Survekshan 2025-26, the Centre’s annual cleanliness survey covering more than 4,751 urban centres across the country. Surat in Gujarat secured the second position, followed by Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh.
The awards mark the 10th edition of the nationwide cleanliness assessment conducted under the Swachh Bharat Mission-Urban by the Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs.
The survey assessed urban local bodies on 43 indicators across 10 key areas, including waste segregation, collection and transportation, solid waste management, visible cleanliness, sanitation facilities and wastewater management.
This year’s assessment also placed greater emphasis on public participation, cleanliness at tourist and heritage sites, urban riverfronts, coastlines and water bodies. More than 2.70 crore citizens provided feedback during the survey, according to the ministry.
In other categories, Visakhapatnam, Jabalpur and Lucknow emerged as the top three cleanest cities among urban centres with populations exceeding 10 lakh. Madhya Pradesh’s Rewa secured the first position among clean riverfront towns, followed by Bilaspur in Chhattisgarh and Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh.
Rudrapur in Uttarakhand was recognised as the cleanest Himalayan city, while Puri in Odisha topped the coastal towns category.
The survey also highlighted improvements across smaller urban centres, with more than 1,700 cities with populations below 50,000 improving their rankings compared with the previous edition. The results underline the growing role of civic bodies and public participation in improving urban sanitation and waste management across India.