Union Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Manohar Lal launched the PRAGATI-50 initiative on September 29 to develop 50 cities across 24 states as model cities for urban cleanliness under Swachh Bharat Mission-Urban 2.0.
Designating a specific set of ‘model cities’ rather than mandating uniform standards nationwide is a common approach to urban reform, since it allows for concentrated resources and monitoring in a smaller set of cities before wider rollout.
The inclusion of major cities, cultural sites, tourism destinations and economic centres in the selection suggests a deliberate mix, prioritising cities where visible improvement would carry outsized reputational and economic value alongside the direct sanitation benefit.
Pairing the initiative with supporting tools, a digital behaviour-change repository, waste-collection SOPs and source-segregation guidelines, indicates an attempt to address both the technical and the behavioural sides of urban cleanliness simultaneously, rather than treating them as separate problems.
Whether PRAGATI-50 produces durable change will likely be judged, as with earlier urban cleanliness initiatives, by whether the KPI-based monitoring translates into measurable, sustained improvement in these 50 cities rather than a short-term push around the launch itself.
Key focus areas include solid waste management, used water management, sanitation and citizen participation.
The initiative uses a ‘City as a Whole’ approach, involving all stakeholders including Urban Local Bodies in planning and implementation.
A Swachhata Behaviour Change Digital Kosh was also launched alongside PRAGATI-50, offering a digital repository of communication and campaign material.
A Standard Operating Procedure for setting up secondary collection centres for construction and demolition waste was released as part of the launch.
Guidelines for source segregation of municipal solid waste were also released.
Chandigarh is among the cities set to be developed as a model city for urban cleanliness under PRAGATI-50.
The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs oversees urban development and sanitation programmes at the national level.
Swachh Bharat Mission cleanliness drive (representative image), Wikimedia Commons, GODL-India