Communities have evolved through multiple forms of political organisations where source of power is either in hands of one (monarch), a few (oligarchy), or many (democracy). Democracy, which literally means ‘power to the people’ was one of the early forms of political organisations that intended to give power to the citizens. It is interesting to note that it was communities and cities that provided the initial template for democracy that got translated at national level. Now we are coming back to conforming these templates at a city level. We indeed have come a long way where courts have to intervene to allow citizen's participation in functioning of urban local bodies from the times when the first urban local bodies in India could only be formed if residents of the city made an application for their formation. 

Cities like Ujjain, Chas, Ambikapur and others are in top 20 national rankings of Swachh Sarvekshan. Cities like Bhadson, Panchgani, Bundu, Siddipet have topped the zonal rankings. Chances are that many of us wouldn't have heard of these cities before. So while sanitation is coming to centre stage, it is also bringing those cities to centre stage with it.