Keep doors leading to rooftops locked on Kali Puja: WBPCB

Kolkata: The West Bengal Pollution Control Board (WBPCB) and the Kolkata Police have urged the associations of multi-storeyed apartments in the city and its suburbs to keep the doors leading to the roof of their apartments locked on the day of Kali Puja.

Senior officials of WBPCB, Kolkata Police, Bidhannagar City Police and Howrah City Police held a meeting with the associations of a good number of high-rise housing complexes on Saturday.

"We have learnt from our experiences of the past few years that dropping firecrackers from highrises have been a major problem and in some cases its impact has been extremely harmful. So we have urged the heads of the building associations to keep their doors of the roofs locked from the evening till night on the day of Kali Puja," a senior official of PCB said.

Howrah Police Commissioner D P Singh cited an incident that happened two years back when a fire cracker landed on the head of a youth leading to his death.

WBPCB officials also expressed their concerns over poor air quality in the city particularly during the days when Fifa Under-17 World Cup matches are being held in the city." We have shared our database regarding the air quality and have appealed to them to use such crackers that emit less smoke," Chairman of WBPCB Kalyan Rudra said.

The police informed them of the firecrackers that are banned because of their sound limits going over 90 decible that has been prescribed by the Supreme Court.

The Apex Court has recently banned fireworks in Delhi to curb pollution. A senior PCB official said that they had also appealed to people to stick to a minimum when it comes to bursting firecrackers.

"If the trend is not checked Kolkata would be following Delhi where, till last Diwali, people had to buy masks along with fireworks. Already many have been found in the city buying masks ahead of the Festival of Lights. Particulate matter in air in Kolkata during Kali Puja and Diwali is more than double the permissible limit," a senior WBPCB official said.

All have been requested to stick to the decibel level and for the sake of neighbours and the elderly. Crackers should not be burst between 10 pm and 6 am. The WBPCB ban on bursting of firecrackers across all silence zones and during day time — 10 am to 6 pm — would also continue to be in force across the state and the police and WBPCB officials will be on strict vigil to ensure the decibel ban.

In added areas of the city where there are narrow lanes, police will travel in auto rickshaws to keep a watch on any sort of nuisance.