Mumbai News: BMC Ranks 33rd In Swachh Survekshan 2024-25; City Falls Short In Waste Segregation, Legacy Dump Cleanup

Mumbai: Mumbai has once again failed to secure a higher rank in the 'Swachh Survekshan 2024-25, a nationwide sanitation survey of all cities. Although the city's ranking improved slightly, moving from 37 last year to 33 this year, key performance areas showed a decline. Door-to-door waste collection and segregation at source worsened compared to the previous year.

Additionally, the civic body lost substantial marks in legacy waste management and scientific waste processing, which negatively impacted its overall score.

The BMC has set an ambitious target to make Mumbai a zero-garbage city by 2030. However, progress remains uneven across key areas of waste management. One of the major setbacks has been the failure to achieve 100% segregation of dry and wet waste, especially after several garbage processing units in housing societies were shut down post-pandemic.

While there has been some improvement in the waste generation versus processing ratio—rising from 49% last year to 62% this year, the civic body has fared poorly in source segregation, which stands at just 31%, and door-to-door waste collection, at 40%. The city performed worst in remediation of dumpsites, scoring only 16%, although that is a slight improvement from 9% last year.

While Mumbai was revalidated as Open Defecation Free (ODF), the BMC received a zero-star rating in the Garbage-Free City (GFC) assessment. The cleanliness level of public toilets was also found to be just 50%. The BMC lost maximum marks in legacy waste management and scientific waste processing—two key components of the GFC framework.

Commenting on the assessment, Kiran Dighavkar, Deputy Municipal Commissioner (Solid Waste Management), said: “We have already initiated steps such as setting up a Waste-to-Energy plant at the Deonar dumpsite. Bids have been invited for the Rs. 2,368 crore bioremediation project aimed at treating 185 lakh tonnes of legacy waste at Deonar. Meanwhile, processing of 70 lakh metric tonnes of waste is already underway at the Mulund dumping ground. With these efforts, we hope to see an improvement in our ranking next year.”

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Godfrey Pimenta, founder of WatchDog Foundation said, "The overall 33rd position indicates room for improvement in areas such as citizen feedback, waste segregation, and the consistency of sanitation services. Also citizens should cooperate in BMC’s efforts to make it a livable city. Lack of civic sense is a major hurdle in a city lacking in cleanliness. The BMC was ranked 31st in the Swachh Survekshan 2022."