NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court on Monday sought a response from the Centre on a plea seeking to direct public and private sector oil companies to contribute funds to public transport services of Delhi-NCR to compensate for environmental damage caused due to fossil fuels.
A bench of Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Sachin Datta asked the ministries of petroleum and natural gas, road transport and highways, and environment and forest to file their replies to the petition and listed it for further hearing on July 21.
The plea by an organisation named ‘Tsunami on Road’, through its representative Sanjay Kulshrestha, said that to reduce health hazards due to severe air pollution in Delhi, the oil companies be asked to contribute under corporate social responsibility.
The petitioner, represented through advocate Sumant Bharadwaj, also sought direction to the government to form a committee of technical and environmental experts to study the public transport systems of Delhi and NCR (DTC and Metro) and make suggestions.
“As per the most recent report of October 16, 2018, the Ministry of Earth Sciences accepted that the transport sector is the major source of emission of PM2.5 (41 per cent) followed by dust from roads and other sources (21.5 per cent) and industries (18.6 per cent) in the city,” the plea said.
It said PM2.5 is the most dangerous pollutant amongst all as it can penetrate deep into the lungs and cause respiratory problems.
“A better public transport system is a dire need for a heavily polluted city like Delhi. This is a universally accepted fact worldwide that mass public transport methods are the most important and cost-effective means for reducing air pollution, and traffic congestion, especially in 50 lakhs plus cities,” the plea said.
The plea said as per international guidelines, the three most important areas that need to be covered by CSR are environment, health, and education.