Seven of the 10 cleanest cities in India are in the southern states, according to the first listing on urban cleanliness done by the government.

The cities in the north are in a mess—yet another indication of growing divergence between different parts of the country in terms of social indicators.

The new Swachh Bharat index also shows that most of our largest urban agglomerations are very unclean. Lutyens’ Delhi is clean, but the rest of the city does not do well at all. Mumbai is a mirror image. The main city is unclean, while Navi Mumbai across the water is one of our cleanest cities. That tells us something about the sociology of our two biggest urban clusters.

A big surprise is the Gujarati city of Surat. Its filth was once legendary. The city was brought to its knees by plague in 1994. The civic administration then worked with shocked citizens to clean Surat. Its rank is now 63 out of 476 cities. Surat shows that it can be done.

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