NEW DELHI: As concerns are being raised over two global reports,which said that the Indian cities were among the most polluted in the world, Minister of State for Environment Prakash Javadekar said the ranking based on the World Health Organisation and Yale University studies hadn’t taken into account all the parameters of pollution, adding that though pollution was undoubtedly increasing in the country and the vehicle density had grown from eight crore to 16 crore, rankings couldn’t be done only on the basis of air pollution.
He said there were 20 pollution indicators such as pesticide regulation, change in forest cover, access to drinking water, access to sanitation, waste water treatment and agricultural subsidies.
“The ranking is not based on all these parameters. Also, the Uni survey was done from the satellite and there was no ground proof,” he said.
Expressing concern over the increase in the number of diesel vehicles, Javadekar said the country needed to put more emphasis on public transport and that people should choose petrol vehicles over diesel ones to save the earth. He said the govt was measuring the air quality in at least 240 cities and promoting public transport.
According to a WHO study released in May, Delhi is the most polluted city in the world when it comes to air quality. As per the study, the situation is very bad here and its air has PM2.4 concentration of 153 micrograms and PM10 concentrations of 286 micrograms.