NEW DELHI: Delhi has fared better in terms of inspections and actions against pollution among NCR states, as per the affidavit filed by the Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) before the Supreme Court on Friday.
The action taken report (from November 26 to December 7) data on various directions showed that Delhi led in terms of field inspections and taking action compared to the NCR states of Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan.
While the Delhi government teams made a total of 3,404 inspections of industrial units, Haryana did 1,003, UP 1,775 and Rajasthan 257, the affidavit showed. While Delhi had 82 teams deployed for action, Haryana had 28, UP 35 and Rajasthan 8, it said. As per the affidavit, the number of industries using unapproved fuels directed for closure in Delhi stood at 12 while UP and Haryana, which have a much larger areas having industrial clusters only found 6 and 8 such units, respectively. Rajasthan had none in this category.
The CAQM had Tuesday directed the NCR states that industries using unapproved fuels in areas where clean fuel infrastructure and supply is available and have still not switched to it shall remain closed till December 12 pending further review. Also, in restricting diesel/petrol vehicles older than 10 and 15 years, respectively, Delhi has impounded 974 such vehicles while Haryana did 610. Uttar pradesh lags behind at 144 in this category followed by Rajasthan at 29.
Stringent implementation of the directions on ground was necessary after the SC pulled up the Centre and state governments for not doing enough to curb the consistently high levels of pollution in the Delhi-NCR. Recent studies have proved that Delhi’s pollution is not its alone and almost 70 per cent of it comes from emissions from other NCR states.
A senior official from the Haryana State Pollution Control Board (HSPCB) said their teams are on ground and have issued closure directions to all units not complying with norms.
“We have been working on the ground day and night. Unlike Delhi, industries are not concentrated in the state. Some of our industries concentrated in districts such as Gurugram and Faridabad are doing well, but in Sonipat and Panipat, not all industries have the infrastructure for conversion to cleaner fuel. Also, industries have expanded beyond that,” the official said.
Meanwhile, Delhi’s air quality after showing some improvement over the past two days returned to ‘very poor’ on Friday. The 24-hour average Air Quality Index (AQI) was 314, as against 289, the previous day.
Action report
The affidavit filed by the CAQM gave details of short and long term measures being taken by it in consultation with states and other authorities to control air pollution