Aurangabad: With revised norms for assessing cities in cleanliness surveys under Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, the local civic body is going to have a tough time in improving previous year's abysmal ranking of 299. Aurangabad is among 4,041 cities and towns across the country that will be assessed under 'Swachh Survekshan-2018', scheduled to take place in January.The exercise will evaluate sanitation services and their sustainability, outcomes of central cleanliness mission, citizen connect and visible impact on ground.The new guidelines, issued by the central government, have given more weightage to processing and disposal of solid waste and innovative methods of disposal; both of these parameters have been increased by 5% each. The weightage for collection and transportation of solid waste has been slashed by 10%.Also, in order to avoid civic bodies from making fake claims regarding the development in sanitation and service levels, negative marking has been introduced as a part of the cleanliness survey. Accordingly, if any of the claims of civic bodies are found to be incorrect, 33% of the total marks will be cut.While Aurangabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) has already been struggling with waste management and other civic issues, it remains to be seen how the city as a whole fairs in upcoming national level survey.Civic activist Rajendra Datey-Patil said, "Aurangabad has bleak chances of improving its ranking in Swachh Survekshan-2018. The cleanliness mission of the centre should have become public movement by now, but in Aurangabad it is still on papers. No effective administrative and political leadership is bound to have adverse impact on city's prospects in the survey," he said.AMC additional commissioner, Shrikrishna Bhalsingh, said, "We are making our preparations for the Swachh Survekshan-2018, keeping in view the revised norms." Bhalsingh is also the nodal officer of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.Bhalsingh said, "Conscious efforts are being taken to improve public participation in centre's cleanliness mission. The government has introduced special mobile app for ensuring maximum public participation. We are spreading awareness about this app that can be also used for raising grievances," he said.There are 500 cities and 3,541 towns participating in the national survey. The rankings will be announced in March next year.Besides the national rankings for the towns, the authorities will also announce state and zonal rankings. The survey will rank cities and towns on 71 sanitation related parameters with different weightages for a total of 4,000 marks."The maximum score has been doubled this time in order to avoid crowding of cities with very marginal differences in scores," an official release said.

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