NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed no coercive action to be taken against the owners of 10-year-old diesel and 15-year-old petrol vehicles in Delhi- National Capital Region (NCR) and also decided to re-examine the 2018 blanket ban on these.
A three-judge bench of the apex court, headed by Chief Justice B R Gavai and Justices K Vinod Chandran and N V Anjaria, decided to re-examine the issue after hearing an application filed by the Delhi government to recall the court's order of October 29, 2018, that upheld the National Green Tribunal's (NGT) 2015 directive in this regard.
The top court also issued notice to the Centre and Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) on the plea of Delhi government and asked them to file a detailed response on the matter.
During the course of the hearing, the Solicitor General (SG) Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Delhi government, requested the apex court to consider ordering no coercive steps in this regard against these owners.
"The order needs to be stayed as the police will be under the obligation to start the seizure. The directive was arbitrary," Mehta told the SC.
The apex court allowed the request of Mehta and passed the order of not to take any coercive steps against the owners of 10-year-old diesel and 15-year-old petrol vehicles in Delhi-NCR and fixed the matter for further hearing after four weeks.
In a lighter vein, the CJI observed that earlier, one used to use cars for 40-50 years. Now still vintage cars are there.
The Delhi government had moved the apex court seeking a direction to recall of the apex court’s October 29, 2018, order that upheld the NGT's initial directive.
"A comprehensive policy is required to tackle pollution in Delhi-NCR, which gives vehicle fitness based on actual emission levels of individual vehicles as per scientific methods rather than implementing a blanket ban based solely on age," the Delhi government in the plea said.
The government further stressed on highliting the fact that such a ban on such vehicles would not be necessary as, after 2018, stricter standards of monitoring of emissions and increased coverage of pollution testing have been made applicable. "There should be a ban based on emissions, rather than the vehicle's age," it added in its plea.
Pointing out that most developed countries, including the European Union, Japan, the United States, and others, do not adopt blanket bans based solely on age of the vehicle, the plea said rather than to have a measured and sustainable approach to deal with the issue of Air Pollution and De-congestion of City Centres holistically, rationale approach on pollution should be fixed.
Lawyer Charu Mathur, appearing for petitioners Arun Kumar Singh and other individual owners of such vehicles, argued that they paid full taxes and registration fees for 15 years.
"The retrospective application of the guidelines to vehicles purchased before the 2015 order is arbitrary, violates their legitimate expectation, and deprives them of their right to property under Article 300A of the Constitution," the Delhi government said.
Questioning the rationale of treating all overaged vehicles as equally polluting, regardless of their actual emission levels, the Delhi government said that this lack of classification based on pollution levels, despite the availability of modern emission testing technologies, is arbitrary.
"Even some older vehicles may still meet emission standards due to proper maintenance," it stated.
