In a big leap, Assam's Rangiya railway junction under the Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) zone has been declared as India's seventh cleanest ‘A' category railway station. The previous year, it was in the 78th position. However, the NFR zone as a whole has slipped three spots in one year to finish as the dirtiest among the country's Top 10 zones, according to an audit report on station cleanliness. Jogbani station of Bihar under NFR has been ranked as the dirtiest in the country by the survey. Among the stations in the region under NFR zone, Silchar is the dirtiest whose national ranking is 392 among 407 stations.
While Vishakhapatnam has emerged as the cleanest station in Al category, Beas earned the top spot among 'A category stations. The survey was conducted by Quality Council of India (QCI) in 407 major railway stations (75 A1 category and 332 A category stations). The survey parameters adopted were evaluation of process of cleanliness in parking, main entry area, main platform, waiting room by direct observation by the assessors and passenger feedback.
Guwahati, the region's biggest station and one of the only two Al category stations in the NFR zone, has improved the maximum in cleanliness index, taking a leap from 353rd spot in 2016 to 37th in 2017. The other Al station, New Jalpaiguri, slumped from 49th position to 132.
