NEW DELHI: Calling the pollution control boards of Delhi-NCR “ineffective” due to staff shortage, the Supreme Court on Tuesday asked the body responsible for air quality management in the national capital and adjoining areas to explain how it proposes to tackle pollution and stubble burning which would spike with the onset of winter.
“Today, the situation is that there are large number of vacant posts in the state pollution control boards rendering them ineffective’We therefore call upon the chairman of CAQM to remain present through video conferencing on the next date of hearing and explain what steps does the commission propose to take,” a bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Augustine George Masih stated.
The bench also wondered how the sub-committee on safeguarding and enforcement to be constituted by the CAQM will function due to lack of representation from the state pollution control boards of Delhi, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh due to the vacancies.
It directed the five NCR states to fill the vacant posts urgently, preferably before April 30, 2025. The bench also directed the CAQM chairperson to file an affidavit explaining the steps the commission proposes to take to check the air pollution menace, often attributed to burning of paddy straw on farms in the states adjoining the national capital, and posted the matter for further hearing on September 2.
During the hearing, senior advocate Aprajita Singh, who is assisting the court as an amicus curiae in the matter, stated, Counsel for the Delhi government submitted that out of the 344 sanctioned posts in the Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC), as many as 233 are vacant. The bench noted the “sad state of affairs” in the capital city and asked the Delhi government to fill these vacancies by April 30, 2025.
It noted that out of the 652 sanctioned posts in Punjab, 314 are vacant and in Haryana, where 202 of the 483 sanctioned posts are vacant and issues identical order.