Indore Shows The Way, Nagpur Dumps Its Gains
Door-to-door garbage collection, scientific landfilling at Bhandewadi, and regular street sweeping earned the city accolades under the National Urban Sanitation Policy. Nagpur was once among the top five cleanest cities in India and seen as a role model for urban waste management. But that was year 2014.
A front-runner in cleanliness rankings and recipient of multiple awards under the Sant Gadge Baba and Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru campaigns between 2001 and 2012, a decade later, the tables have turned.
In Swachh Survekshan 2024–25, Nagpur slipped to 27th rank among 44 cities with a million-plus population. Even more damning is the fact that the city failed to secure a single star in the garbage-free city (GFC) certification — scoring just 1% in source segregation.
Indore retained the No. 1 spot for the sixth consecutive year, a reflection of its consistent public participation, robust enforcement, and unwavering civic discipline.
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"What went wrong?" asks Dr Milind Ganvir, former health officer (sanitation), who once oversaw Nagpur's acclaimed bin-free model. "When Indore officials visited us, they admired our system. But while they kept improving, we became laggards."
Despite outsourcing waste collection to two private firms, Nagpur's streets are now strewn with over 400 garbage vulnerable points (GVPs) — a number officials privately admit is an undercount.
Black spots have mushroomed across every zone, from residential colonies to market areas. Civic officials claim vehicles arrive on time, but residents continue to dump garbage in the open, ignoring collection schedules and basic waste segregation norms.
The Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) has the infrastructure — around 7,000 sanitary workers, six road sweeping machines, three robotic drainage cleaners, 21 suction-cum-jetting machines (plus two newly added by the state), and five suction machines.
Yet the real problem, officials admit, lies in the lack of civic sense.
An Indore-based sanitation supervisor who once visited Nagpur minced no words saying: "People's approach won't change merely with slogans. In Indore, after two or three warnings, we issue heavy fines. People have learned — discipline comes when enforcement is strict and constant." Indore also employs NGOs for ground-level monitoring, uses a command-and-control centre to track garbage vehicles in real-time, and ensures an immediate response if a collection round is missed.
In contrast, Nagpur's enforcement has remained only on paper. Warnings are issued, but penalties are rare. "You can't keep explaining the same thing to people repeatedly," said an NMC official. "Without action, awareness becomes background noise," the official added.
A senior sanitation worker said, "It's not that Nagpur doesn't care. Schools participate, citizens join campaigns. But it vanishes the moment you ask them to stop throwing garbage near their homes."
Nagpur's fall is not just administrative. It's a reflection of widespread public apathy and erosion of accountability — both civic and individual. While the infrastructure has grown, people's willingness to respect it has shrunk.
Nagpur's crash is a wake-up call. Equipment and personnel mean little if roads continue to be used as dumping grounds and public behaviour remains unchanged. "To reclaim lost ground, the city must not only enforce rules but also trigger a cultural shift — from indifference to ownership, from evasion to engagement. Until then, Nagpur's promise of becoming a truly clean city will remain buried under its own waste," said sanitation expert Dr Pradip Dasarwar.
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