• The Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs (MoHUA) Shri Hardeep Singh Puri launched the sixth edition of the annual cleanliness survey of urban India, the toolkit for Swachh Survekshan 2021.
• Swachh Survekshan is redesigned innovatively every year, to ensure that the process becomes more robust, with a focus on sustaining the behaviour change. 
• In 2019, the Ministry’s efforts focussed on ensuring the sustainability of the sanitation value chain, the SS 2021 indicators focus on parameters pertaining to wastewater treatment and reuse along with faecal sludge.
• MoHUA provided a detailed presentation on the methodology and various parameters of Swachh Survekshan 2021.

Prerak Dauur Samman:

• A new category of awards titled Prerak Dauur Samman will be given as a part of Swachh Survekshan 2021. Top three cities will be recognized in each category. The award has a total of five additional sub-categories namely:
  Divya (Platinum)
  Anupam (Gold)
  Ujjwal (Silver)
  Udit (Bronze)
  Aarohi (Aspiring) 
   
•  A new category ‘population category’ been added. It will categorize cities on the basis of six select indicator wise performance criteria which are as follows:
  Segregation of waste into Wet, Dry and Hazard categories
  Processing capacity against wet waste generated
  Processing and recycling of wet and dry waste
  Construction & Demolition (C&D) waste processing
  Percentage of waste going to landfills
  Sanitation status of cities