None of the 423 class-I cities in India is “healthy and clean” in terms of various sanitation parameters, and 99 per cent of them suffer from poor or absent community toilets and safe management of human excreta, says a government-commissioned study published on Monday.

Over 47 per cent of all cities ranked are found to be “needing immediate remedial action” in terms of sanitation facilities and 54 per cent need “considerable improvement,” says the study commissioned by the Union ministry of urban development.
That means that as many as 419 of 423 cities studied fall in the categories of either requiring urgent action or considerable improvement in sanitation parameters such as access to community tiolets, safe management of human excreta and solid waste collection and treatment.

Only 4 cities are found to be in the category of “recovering” in terms of sanitation facilities, finding top slots in the rankings. These are Chandigarh at the top with a score of 73.480, followed by Mysore (70.650), Surat (69.080), and New Delhi Municipal Corporartion-administered area (68.265).
With a score of 16.750, Churu in Rajasthan is at the bottom of the list.

Conducted as part of the national urban sanitation policy by AC Nielsen ORG MARG, Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology (CEPT), and Development Research Services (DRS), the study also says: “As many as 380 of the 436 cities collect and treat less than 40 per cent of their human excreta.”
The study covers 423 cities, divided into five zones, representing 72 per cent of India’s urban population. The rankings are based on 19 sanitation parameters such as access to community tiolets, safe management of human excreta and solid waste collection and treatment.

Four colour codes have been assigned to the cities based on the points they obtained in the rating; red means the cities need 'immediate remedial action', black means 'need considerable improvement', blue means ‘recovering’, green means ‘healthy and clean’.
A 'healthy and green city' would have required a score between 91 and 100.

The rating was conducted between December 2009 and April 2010.
"The idea is to have healthy competition between various states and within the states," said Jaipal Reddy, urban development minister, while releasing the report.