NEW DELHI: Aiming to control the increasing level of pollution in the city, the Delhi Government has formed 611 teams of officials under its ‘Anti Open Burning Special Campaign’ to stop the incidents of open burning in the city. The government appealed to all the agencies and Resident Welfare Association (RWAs) of the capital to provide heaters to their employees and guards on night duty.
Environment Minister Gopal Rai on Tuesday asked officials of the concerned departments to run the campaign for the next 10 days in view of increasing pollution in the city. “Under the campaign, 611 teams of Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC), Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), Revenue, Department of Irrigation and Flood Control and other departments will take action on the ground,” Rai said.
“Staying at ground zero, all the teams will ensure that there is no open burning anywhere in the capital and if incidents of burning are found, action will be taken by the teams against the concerned people. Special responsibility has been given to concerned departments and agencies for this campaign,” he said.
Rai further said that these teams will monitor the situation day and night. They will patrol continuously even at night to control incidents of garbage burning. “The government has succeeded in reducing pollution with the cooperation of the people and it is running several campaigns for the same,” he added.
The Delhi minister appealed to all the residents to register a complaint on the ‘Green Delhi’ application in case of any incident of open burning so that the incident of such sorts reaches the department in the least possible time and the department can take action against them. Delhi’s air quality plunged to the severe category on Monday and the 24-hour average AQI stood at 410 at 4 pm. Pollution levels ameliorated to the very poor category on Tuesday morning the overall AQI stood at 376 at 11 am.
The Centre’s air quality panel on Monday decided not to invoke curbs under the Stage III of the anti-air pollution action plan despite the situation in the national capital have worsened to the ‘severe’ category recently.