Jaipur, Jodhpur, Durgapura cleanest stations: Survey

In a Station Cleanliness Survey on the occasion of the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, it has been unveiled that three stations in Rajasthan namely, Jaipur, Jodhpur and Durgapura have become the top three ranking railway stations among 720 stations. On the other hand, none of the stations in the national capital figured in the top 10 list.

New Delhi: Three stations in Rajasthan bagged top honours but none in the national capital figured in the top 10 list of railways' cleanliness survey unveiled on Wednesday by Railway Minister Piyush Goyal on the occasion of the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.

Jaipur, Jodhpur and Durgapura have become the top three ranking railway stations among 720 stations.

In the national capital, Anand Vihar Terminal was ranked 26, New Delhi station 165 and Hazrat Nizamuddin stood at 241 in the list. While Sadar Bazar was among the last in the list of clean stations, Delhi Cantonment, Delhi Junction and Shahadra were ranked 389, 390 and 378 respectively.

Among the 109 suburban stations assessed, Andheri, Virar and Naigaon are the top three.

The North Western Railway, which covers a route length of more than 5,761 km across parts of Rajasthan, Gujarat, Punjab and Haryana, topped the list of zones, followed by South East Central Railway and East Central Railway.

The railways have been conducting third-party audit and cleanliness ranking of 407 major stations annually since 2016. This year, the survey was expanded to include 720 stations and suburban stations were also included for the first time.

Evaluation of green efforts has also been added to the report.

Goyal said, "Today we are committed to developing a Clean India, Healthy India and Prosperous India. The railways are doing its bit to provide a clean and hygienic environment to the travellers."

"Many governments came after Independence, but there was a delay in carrying out Bapu's (Mahatma Gandhi's) vision until Prime Minister Narendra Modi took over the responsibility of the country," he said, adding the railways has also banned single-use plastic across its premises Wednesday onwards.

In the Station Cleanliness Survey, it was found that among the non-suburban stations, two per cent have scored above 90 per cent of the total score whereas five per cent stations scored below 50 per cent.

Among the suburban stations, four per cent of the stations scored within the range of 70 per cent to 80 per cent, whereas 14 per cent stations scored 50 per cent.

The survey also found that out of 720 stations, 25 per cent had provision for water conservation, 18 per cent of them had a mechanism for rainwater harvesting and nine per cent had provision for water reuse.

Only two per cent stations had green certification while 29 per cent had provision for on-site renewable energy using solar panels. The survey also revealed that 66 per cent of the stations were using LED bulbs.

Four stations of Southern Railway -- Perungalathur, Guduvanchari, Singaperumalkoil, Ottapallam -- were at the bottom of the rankings. Non-suburban stations Faizabad and Ayodhya in Uttar Pradesh have shown the most improvement from last year, the survey found.