New Delhi, Oct 1: Indore was adjudged India's cleanest city for the sixth time in a row, while Surat and Navi Mumbai followed it on the next two spots in the Central government's annual cleanliness survey, the results of which were announced Saturday.

In the category of best performing states in 'Swachh Survekshan Awards 2022', Madhya Pradesh has secured the first position, followed by Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra.

Indore and Surat retained their top positions in the big cities category this year, while Vijaywada lost its third spot to Navi Mumbai.

Among the states having fewer than 100 urban local bodies, Tripura has bagged the top rank, according to the survey results.

President Droupadi Murmu on Saturday gave away the awards to the winners at an event here also attended by Union Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Hardeep Singh Puri and others.

In the category of cities having population fewer than one lakh, Maharashtra's Panchgani was ranked number one, followed by Chhattisgarh's Patan (NP) and Maharashtra's Karhad.

Haridwar was adjudged the cleanest Ganga town in the category of more than 1 lakh population, followed by Varanasi and Rishikesh.

Bijnor was ranked the first among Ganga towns with fewer than one lakh population. followed by Kannauj and Garhmukhteshwar respectively.

In to the survey, Maharashtra's Deolali was adjudged the country's cleanest Cantonment Board.

The 7th edition of Swachh Survekshan was conducted to study the progress of the Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban) and rank the Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) based on various cleanliness and sanitation parameters.

The Survekshan has evolved from being an assessment of 73 cities in 2016 to covering 4,354 cities this year.

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New Delhi (PTI): The Supreme Court on Monday directed President Droupadi Murmu's secretary to place before her the mercy petition of death row convict Balwant Singh Rajoana, convicted in the 1995 assassination case of then Punjab chief minister Beant Singh, for consideration.

A bench of Justices B R Gavai, P K Mishra and K V Viswanathan requested the President to consider the plea within two weeks.

"Inspite of the matter being specifically kept today none appeared for Union of India. The bench assembled only for this case," the bench said.

"On the last date the matter was adjourned to enable the Union to take instructions from the office of the President as to by when will mercy plea be decided. Taking into consideration that the petitioner is on a death row, we direct the secretary to the President of India to place the matter before the President with a request to consider the same within two weeks from today," the bench said.

The matter will now be heard on December 5.

On September 25, the top court had sought responses from the Centre, the Punjab government and the administration of the Union Territory of Chandigarh on Rajoana's plea.

The then Punjab chief minister and 16 others were killed in a blast at the entrance of the civil secretariat in Chandigarh on August 31, 1995.

A special court sentenced Rajoana to death in July 2007.

Rajoana has said that a mercy petition under Article 72 of the Constitution was moved by the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) on his behalf in March 2012.

On May 3 last year, the apex court had refused to commute his death sentence and said the competent authority could deal with his mercy plea.