“All the governments have to come together and launch a joint war against pollution; if all government and all parties come together, we can control pollution in less than 4 years”, Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal said on Monday in a press meet.
Delhi’s air quality index (AQI) has crossed 250 range recently. An AQI between 0 and 50 is considered ‘good’, 51 and 100 ‘satisfactory’, 101 and 200 ‘moderate’, 201 and 300 ‘poor’, 301 and 400 ‘very poor’, and 401 and 500 ‘severe’.
Physically signs and data metrics show that Delhi air quality is clearly on a poor level. Delhi Government has registered that Stubble Burning in the city is a major cause of air pollution in Delhi. The pollution due to farm fires from the neighboring States have also been a major contributor.
Few days ago, Union Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar said that stubble burning is not a major factor for air pollution in Delhi-NCR. “Only 4 percent pollution is due to stubble burning. Ninety-six per cent of it is due to local factors like biomass burning, garbage dumping, unpaved roads, dust, construction and demolition activities etc,” he said.
Countering to that statistics, Delhi’s Rajinder Nagar’s MLA Raghav Chadha pointed “Central Pollution Control Board’s own estimate of 2019 suggest stubble burning contributed up to 44% to Delhi’s air pollution.” “Ministry of Earth Sciences’ SAFAR said at peak of stubble burning in Punjab & Haryana account for 44% of Delhi’s pollution.”
On Monday, Kejriwal stressed “this is not the time to play politics. We must all come together to fight the air pollution.”
Delhi must take some positive steps to curb pollution due to the facts that before the arrival of winter, the scenario is getting difficult, and in a few weeks, Diwali will be celebrated in the country. It may make it very hard for Delhi to recover later if preventive measures are not unrolled.