Bilkul Sateek News
Gurugram (Paridhi Dhasmana), 21 July — Gurugram has proudly bagged the 41st rank in this year’s Swachh Survekshan, and yet, the city’s streets tell a different story — one of garbage heaps, stray animals, and government apathy masquerading as civic achievement.
At Prem Mandir, Old Railway Road, cows graze leisurely in open garbage mounds. Plastic waste, half-burnt offerings, and rotting food form a daily buffet for animals left to fend for themselves. Devotion lies discarded under discarded wrappers — a poetic, if painful, image of where things stand.
The visuals were shared by local residents, who now ask a piercing question: “Are we supposed to feel proud of this 41st rank?”
Let’s be clear: the problem is not new. At Bilkul Sateek News, we’ve been consistently spotlighting Gurugram’s worsening sanitation crisis — exposing the Swachh Survekshan paradox where — how Gurugram climbed the cleanliness ladder while simultaneously sinking under its own filth. Residents are raising their voices again — about the unchecked rise in stray animals, the uncollected garbage, and the absence of basic sanitation — because the situation, far from improving, appears to have been airbrushed for rankings.
So, the real question is not “Can we be proud?” but rather: “Where are the authorities?”
Hence, questions arise –
Where is the Municipal Corporation when garbage festers in religious places? Where are the sanitation drives when cattle are eating from dustbins instead of pastures? Where are the civic officers when the citizens are documenting their failure better than the city’s own surveillance systems?
Because while officers sit in AC offices touting PowerPoint presentations and pie charts, the reality outside reeks — literally.
The Swachh rankings may look good on a government optics, photo-ops, and promotional posters, but they don’t fool the people who live among the trash. Cleanliness is not a number; it’s a lived experience. And right now, for large parts of Gurugram, that experience is disgusting.
The irony is inescapable. We rank high in cleanliness while failing to clean up even the optics. We talk of urban development while animals forage through filth. We project smart city status while being outsmarted by our own negligence.
If there’s pride to be found here, it’s in the residents who continue to speak up, despite being ignored time and again. Because clearly, clean governance is still a far bigger ask than a clean street.
