Fighting pollution: Orders galore in '21 but little gains
New Delhi: The Capital will remember 2021 as a year of announcements and orders but little gains as far as the fight against pollution is concerned, with air pollution rising to 2019 levels and the Yamuna, often referred to as the national Capital's lifeline, struggling to survive the ecological assault of sewage and industrial effluents.
Stubble burning, rampant firecracker bursting on Diwali and unfavourable meteorological conditions in the early phase of winters turned the city's air unbreathable. The thick pungent haze over Delhi-NCR smudged landmarks from view and partially blotted out the sun for several days after Diwali, with green think-tank Centre of Science and Environment calling it one of the longest smog episodes in the city.
Even the 24-meter-tall smog tower in Connaught Place, an ambitious pilot project of the Delhi government, could not give breathable air — only proving what environmentalists and scientists have been saying.
On Friday, the city's air quality again worsened into the "very poor" category with an AQI of 321 after a few consecutive days of "poor" air.
Despite the Centre's Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) issuing a slew of directions, including use of a microbial solution, to states to manage paddy residue, the count of farm fires in
Punjab and Haryana exceeded the number recorded in 2017, 2018 and 2019. On November 7, the share of farm fires in
Delhi's pollution rose to 48 percent, the highest in three years.
Delhi saw the Supreme Court and the CAQM going all out to pull it out of an air crisis which forced closure of schools and construction and demolition activities for almost a month and a temporary shutdown of six coal-based power plants within a 300-km radius of Delhi and industries in NCR that failed to move to piped natural gas. The air quality panel imposed curbs on entry of trucks, barring those engaged in essential services and run on CNG, to cut down vehicular pollution. The CAQM issued a total of 47 directions and seven advisories during the year to curb air pollution.
While the city government ran several campaigns to reduce air pollution, including 'Red Light On Gaadi Off', anti-dust and anti-burning drives, there is no data to establish these efforts yielded results. with pti inputs
