Swachh Bharat Mission

Geography glossary

Also called: SBM · Topic: Geographical Issues: Pollution, Urban Waste, Slums and Land Degradation · NCERT: Class 12, Ch 9 "Geographical Perspective on Selected Issues and Problems"

Meaning

Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM) is India's national cleanliness and sanitation mission, launched on 2 October 2014. It has two parts: an urban part (SBM-U) and a rural part (SBM-G, "Grameen").

  • It first aimed to make India ODF (Open Defecation Free), meaning a place where no one relieves themselves in the open and everyone uses a toilet.
  • It then moved on to managing solid and liquid waste.
  • NCERT links it to a better life in urban slums, which suffer most from open defecation and waste.

Explanation

Why the mission was needed (cause → process → result)

  • Cause: open defecation and dirty surroundings
  • Many homes had no toilets, especially in villages and city slums.

  • Slums have no safe drinking water and no toilets. They have unplanned drains, and dirty water stands in the lanes.

  • Process: disease spreads

  • Human waste in the open gets into water and food.

  • Illnesses such as diarrhoea spread. People who are already undernourished (eating too little food or the wrong kind) fall sick more often.

  • Result: a cycle of poor health and poverty

  • Sick people lose work days, and children miss school.
  • So better sanitation is a health issue, a dignity issue and an anti-poverty issue.

Phase I: making India ODF (2014–2019)

  • The main tool was building toilets.
  • Over 12 crore household toilets have been built. Their official name is IHHLs (Individual Household Latrines).
  • 2.67 lakh Community Sanitary Complexes (shared toilet blocks) have also been built.

  • Both figures count from 2 October 2014 up to 16 December 2025 [2].

  • Rural sanitation coverage rose from 39% in 2014 to 100% in 2019 [2].

  • Rural India was declared ODF on 2 October 2019. This was Gandhi's 150th birth anniversary.

SBM (Grameen) Phase II: ODF Plus

  • Period: 2020-21 to 2024-25. Central spending continues in 2025-26 [2].
  • Total outlay: over ₹1.40 lakh crore [2].
  • ODF Plus is the next level after ODF. A village is ODF Plus when it meets four conditions:
  • ODF sustainability: people keep using their toilets.
  • Solid waste management: garbage is collected and handled.
  • Liquid waste management: greywater (used water from kitchens and baths) is managed.

  • Visual cleanliness: the village looks clean.

  • Progress as of 16 December 2025 [2]:

  • 4,89,526 villages were declared ODF Plus (Model), which is over 83% of villages. Of these, 4,15,915 have been verified [2].
  • 5.27 lakh villages have solid waste arrangements, and 5.41 lakh have liquid waste arrangements [2].
  • 5,300+ blocks have plastic waste management [2].
  • 970+ community biogas plants work under GOBARdhan [2]. GOBARdhan is a scheme that turns cattle dung and farm waste into biogas and manure.

SBM-Urban 2.0 and Swachh Survekshan

  • SBM-Urban 2.0 started in 2021. It aims for garbage-free cities.

  • This means cities must collect, separate and process their waste, not just build toilets.

  • Swachh Survekshan is a yearly survey. The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) has run it since 2016.

  • It ranks cities on cleanliness, waste handling and what citizens say.
  • The competition pushes cities to keep improving.

Where it occurs

  • All over India: SBM-G covers villages and SBM-U covers towns and cities. Both started on 2 October 2014.
  • Rural side: the PIB year-end review of SBM (Grameen) Phase II comes from the Department of Drinking Water & Sanitation [2].
  • Urban side: MoHUA runs Swachh Survekshan.
  • Indore (Madhya Pradesh) has been ranked the cleanest city every year since 2017.

  • The top cities now compete in a separate Super Swachh League, so other cities also get a chance to win the main ranking.

  • Urban slums are where the mission matters most:

  • Dharavi in central Mumbai, Maharashtra, is crowded and short of services. It has garbage piles and rats.
  • Greater Mumbai, Visakhapatnam (Andhra Pradesh) and Kolkata (West Bengal) have high shares of people living in slums.
  • Census 2011 counted about 6.5 crore slum dwellers in 2,613 towns.

Don't confuse with

  • ODF vs ODF Plus: ODF only means no one defecates in the open. ODF Plus also needs toilets to stay in use, solid and liquid waste to be managed, and the village to look clean. Building toilets alone gives ODF, not ODF Plus.
  • SBM-G vs SBM-U 2.0: SBM-G Phase II (2020-21 to 2024-25) is about ODF Plus villages. SBM-U 2.0 (from 2021) is about garbage-free cities.
  • SBM vs Swachh Survekshan: SBM is the mission (launched 2014) that builds toilets and waste systems. Swachh Survekshan is a yearly ranking survey of cities by MoHUA (started 2016).
  • SBM vs PMAY-U: SBM is about sanitation and waste. PMAY-U (from 2015) is about housing, including in-situ slum redevelopment, which means rebuilding homes on the same slum land.

Prelims Hooks

  • SBM was launched on 2 October 2014. Rural India was declared ODF on 2 October 2019, Gandhi's 150th birth anniversary.
  • Rural sanitation coverage rose from 39% (2014) to 100% (2019) [2].
  • ODF Plus has four parts: ODF sustainability, solid waste management, liquid waste management and visual cleanliness. Trap: "construction of new toilets" is not one of them.
  • SBM-G Phase II runs from 2020-21 to 2024-25 with an outlay of over ₹1.40 lakh crore. Over 83% of villages were ODF Plus (Model) by December 2025 [2].
  • GOBARdhan is the scheme under SBM-G that turns cattle dung and farm waste into biogas and manure, with 970+ community biogas plants [2].
  • Swachh Survekshan is run by MoHUA and began in 2016. Indore has been ranked cleanest every year since 2017.

Mains Points

  • Sanitation as a response to urban slum problems (GS-I):
  • Slums grow on degraded, unsafe land and have no toilets or drains. Open defecation spreads disease and keeps families poor.

  • SBM toilets and SBM-U 2.0's garbage-free cities goal tackle these problems directly. This links NCERT's slum chapter to policy.

  • From building toilets to changing habits and handling waste (GS-III):

  • Phase I built over 12 crore household toilets [2]. Phase II's ODF Plus adds solid, liquid and plastic waste management and GOBARdhan biogas [2].

  • This moves the mission from building things to lasting cleanliness.

  • Limits and way forward:

  • Toilets can fall out of use, and slum data still relies on Census 2011.
  • Next steps:
    • bring ODF Plus style waste management into city slums
    • link SBM with housing schemes such as PMAY-U
    • use Swachh Survekshan rankings to keep cities competing

Related concepts

Read more

Sources

  1. 1Class 12, Ch 9 "Geographical Perspective on Selected Issues and Problems" (primary)
  2. 2PIB, "Year End Review – Department of Drinking Water & Sanitation: Swachh Bharat Mission (Grameen) Phase II" (data as of 16 December 2025)static.pib.gov.in · tier 1