Agartala, Nov 8 (IANS): Tripura's 176-year-old capital Agartala has been awarded the clean and green city award by a New Delhi-based urban policy and development experts group, the city's mayor said here Saturday.

"Agartala topped the 29 towns and cities short-listed by the Skoch Foundation for the award. The capital city has been selected for the award because of its green cover, cleanliness and solid waste management," Agartala Municipal Corporation Mayor Prafulla Jit Sinha told reporters.

With a city population of around five lakh, the Agartala Municipal Corporation is northeast India's oldest municipal body.

Sinha said: "More than 600 municipal workers are keeping the city clean day and night. Besides, 30,000 labourers are also being engaged occasionally under an urban job scheme (Tripura Urban Employment Programme) to clean the city."

"Daily 250 tonnes of solid waste is generated in the municipal areas and collected from each home and sent to the sanitary land-fill stations," he said, adding that a large number of vehicles and containers are being procured from outside the state to collect the garbage from each part of the city.

Agartala is also set to become northeast India's first city to have energy efficient illumination with Light Emitting Diode (LED).

Ashutosh Jindal, state urban development secretary, said: "Energy Efficiency Services Ltd (EESL) under the union ministry of power, was all set to replace the existing conventional illuminating system of Agartala with LED."

Agartala will be the second city in eastern India after Kolkata where LED street lighting is being installed. So far, Hyderabad and Vijayawada have LED lighting systems.