1: The Noble Event and Noteworthy Participants

- The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) hosted the prestigious Swachh Survekshan Awards 2023.

- The award ceremony was conducted at the Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi.

- Droupadi Murmu, the President of India, attended the function and conferred the awards on the respective winners.

2: Winners Galore Across Diverse Categories

- Indore and Surat, in a unique turn of events, shared the title of the cleanest city. This achievement marked the seventh successive victory for Indore.

- In the category of cities with a population under one lakh, Sasvad, Patan, and Lonavala emerged as the top three.

- Mhow Cantonment Board in Madhya Pradesh was conferred the cleanest Cantonment Board award.

- Varanasi and Prayagraj were recognized as the cleanest Ganga towns.

- Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh were honoured as the best-performing states in terms of cleanliness.

- Chandigarh was accorded the title of 'Safaimitra Surakshit Sheher'.

3: Highlights and Takeaways from Swachh Survekshan 2023

- The President unveiled the Swachh Survekshan 2023 dashboard during the awards ceremony.

- As part of the event, 110 awards in total were distributed to acknowledge the extraordinary efforts made in maintaining cleanliness.

- "Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle" was announced as the theme for the next Cleanliness Survey.

- Union Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Hardeep Singh Puri, along with a host of distinguished persons, graced the event.

4: The Accomplishments and Key Facts

- With a staggering participation of 4,447 urban local bodies, the Swachh Survekshan 2023 has emerged as the world's largest cleanliness survey.

- High public commitment towards cleanliness was evidenced by the procurement of twelve core citizen responses in the survey.

General Knowledge Insights:

- Swachh Survekshan is a cleanliness survey conducted annually by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA), Government of India.

- The aim of this survey is to encourage large-scale citizen participation and create awareness amongst all sections of society about the importance of working together towards making towns and cities better places to reside in.

- Initiated under the aegis of the Swachh Bharat Mission, the survey assesses cleanliness, hygiene and sanitation in cities and towns of India to foster a healthy competition among them.

- Direct participation of citizens and transparency of the process are some of the unique aspects of Swachh Survekshan.