Indore, India's cleanest city for eight consecutive years, ranked second in the new Mentor City category with partner town Depalpur.More than 4,700 urban local bodies participated in this year's assessment, with Navi Mumbai emerging as the winner. (File photo) Navi Mumbai has emerged as India's cleanest city, followed by Surat and Vijayawada, in the Centre's annual cleanliness survey, Swachh Survekshan 2025-26. The results, announced on Wednesday, also saw Madhya Pradesh's Rewa secure the top position among riverfront towns, while Uttarakhand's Rudrapur was adjudged the cleanest Himalayan city, news agency PTI reported.More than 4,700 urban local bodies participated in this year's assessment, making it one of the country's extensive evaluations of urban sanitation and cleanliness.In the category of cities with a population of over 10 lakh, Greater Visakhapatnam topped the rankings, followed by Jabalpur and Lucknow.Among cities with populations between 3 lakh and 10 lakh, Ujjain secured the first position, while Chandigarh and Guntur finished second and third, respectively.
The latest rankings also brought a change in the position of Indore, which had held the title of India's cleanest city for eight consecutive years. This time, it was placed in the newly introduced Mentor City category under the 'Swachh Shehar Jodi' initiative.
Indore secured the second position alongside its partner town, Depalpur.Ahmedabad emerged as the top performer in this category, with Sanand as its partner town. Tirupati and its partner Kuppam secured the third position.
The initiative aims to encourage knowledge-sharing and improve cleanliness standards in smaller cities through guidance from better-performing urban centres.President Droupadi Murmu presented the awards to the winning cities at a ceremony held on Wednesday.The recognition covered several categories, including riverfront, coastal and Himalayan towns, apart from population-based classifications.Among riverfront towns, Rewa secured the first position, followed by Bilaspur and Varanasi. In the Swachh Coastal Town category, Odisha's Puri emerged as the cleanest, while Kerala's Alappuzha and Maharashtra's Ratnagiri secured the second and third positions, respectively.Rudrapur topped the list of cleanest Himalayan cities.
Jammu finished second, while Shopian secured the third position.The rankings also recognised smaller urban centres. In the population category of 50,000 to 3 lakh, Madhya Pradesh's Dewas emerged as the cleanest city, followed by the New Delhi Municipal Council area in second place and Sagar in third position.Among cities with populations between 20,000 and 50,000, Maharashtra's Vita secured the top rank, while Odisha's Aska and Goa's Panaji finished as the first and second runners-up, respectively.This year's survey was conducted under the theme, 'Swachhata Ki Nayi Pehel – Badhayein Haath, Karein Safai Saath'.According to the Union Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry, more than 3,000 trained assessors carried out extensive field inspections across the country.The evaluation was backed by real-time GPS-enabled monitoring, while the entire process, from evidence submission to verification, was conducted digitally with quality checks at every stage.The ministry also highlighted improvements in the performance of cities participating in the mentorship initiative between the 2024-25 and 2025-26 editions.Under the Visible Cleanliness parameter, their performance increased from 48 per cent to 70 per cent.
Door-to-Door Collection improved from 52 per cent to 74 per cent, while Source Segregation rose from 16 per cent to 30 per cent.Improvements were also recorded in Access to Sanitation, which increased from 11 per cent to 38 per cent, and Used Water Management, which rose from 32 per cent to 53 per cent. Advocacy for Swachhata improved from 48 per cent to 66 per cent.The ministry said these gains reflected stronger sanitation systems and better service delivery through mentorship from high-performing cities.- EndsWith PTI inputs