Indian to make 1000 cities 3-star garbage free by Oct 2024: Hardeep Puri

Waste processing in India has gone up by over four times from 17 per cent in 2014 to 75 per cent

The government will make a thousand cities "3-star garbage free" by October 2024, said a minister on Thursday, referring to standards that include removing garbage mountains and preventing untreated sewage in rivers.

Hardeep S Puri, Minister for Housing and Urban Affairs, announced the plan on International Zero Waste Day 2023 in Delhi.

The Garbage Free Cities (GFC) Star rating protocol was launched in January 2018 to encourage competitive spirit among urban local bodies (ULBs), said Puri. The highest rating is 7-star garbage free: Indore bagged that standard last.

Speaking about Swachh Bharat Mission, Singh said that urban India has become Open Defecation Free (ODF), with all 4,715 ULBs completely ODF, 3,547 ULBs are ODF+ with functional and hygienic community and public toilets, and 1,191 ULBs are ODF++ with complete faecal sludge management.

Waste processing in India has gone up four-fold: from 17 per cent in 2014 to 75 per cent. This has been aided through 100 per cent door-to-door waste collection in 97 per cent wards and source segregation of waste being practised by citizens across almost 90 per cent wards in all ULBs in the country.

Puri expressed confidence that the resolve and determination shown in achieving the targets of SBM-U would be amplified manifold in the second phase of the mission (SBM-U 2.0) where India aims to become a garbage-free nation. He highlighted the importance of a ‘Garbage Free Cities’ rally on Thursday in raising awareness about waste management in the country.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched Swachh Bharat Mission- Urban2.0 on October 1, 2022, with the overall vision of creating ‘Garbage Free Cities’ (GFC).