New Delhi, Jan 15: Concerned over poor air quality in the national capital, the Delhi High Court today directed the Centre, AAP government and other authorities to submit plans to bring the pollution levels within the prescribed limits.
Irked by lack of action plans from the governments and most of the authortities, a bench of justices Badar Durrez Ahmed and Sanjeev Sachdeva asked each department/authority before it to nominate an officer who would ensure compliance of the court’s directions.
The court noted that the Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC), represented by advocate Sanjeev Ralli, was the only body which had filed an action plan as well as pollution data which indicated that during three periods of time – October to November, December to January and May to June — the air pollution in the capital peaked to very high levels.
In October-November, it was due to burning of biomass and crops by the neighbouring states, in December-January it was on account of temperature inversions and in May-June due to dust storms emanating in Rajasthan, DPCC told the court.
The data also indicated that apart from these three periods, the “background pollution” levels during remainder of the year were also beyond prescribed norms.
“This clearly indicates that apart from the peak levels, background pollution levels are way out of prescribed norms.
The reasons for this may be many, including dust pollution from construction activities, vehicular pollution and industrial pollution.
“Therefore, action is required to pull down the peak levels and bring the background pollution within prescribed limits,” the bench said.
It went on to pull up the central government for not submitting any regional or sub-regional plan to curb air pollution in the National Capital Region (NCR) as directed by the court.
The court was hearing a PIL initiated by it on the issue of air pollution.
