New Delhi, May 11: India’s sanitation report card throws in a shocker. Almost 190 cities are on the brink of an environmental emergency, warns the Ministry of Urban Development.
India has no city that it can rate as a green city. And it’s the Urban Development Ministry that’s owning up now! A report released by the ministry shows that more than half of the cities are not in liveable condition. The survey covered 423 cities and were rated according to the 19 sanitation parameters that include sewage, waste and water management.
Apart from a few cities like Chandigarh, Surat, Mysore, Delhi, situation elsewhere is grim. About 190 cities are on the brink of an environmental emergency. Most of them are from Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Bihar.
A whopping 229 cities are listed black and need considerable improvement. The highest number of such cities are in West Bengal, followed by Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.
Only 24 Indian cities manage to collect 80 per cent of their solid waste while six collect 100 per cent. About 17 cities throughout the country have reached the 60 per cent mark when it comes to treatment of waste. Most tourist locations like Srinagar, Amritsar, Shimla and Udaipur have worst sanitation standards.
Reddy says, “I have also noted that there are a number of cities which could easily cross the red category, about 60 of them.” At least a dozen of cities, the reports says, could easily recover from the worst, even as the government initiative to provide liveable sanitation are restricted to only 63 cities.
—Agencies