Delhi lacks teeth to fight pollution

By Sujay Mehdudia

NEW DELHI, OCT. 14.

Continued ad hocism and lack of punitive action have marked the Delhi Government's policy on pollution control in the city. Not only has it failed to launch an all out war against air and water polluters, but it is yet to appoint a regular Secretary-cum- chairman to the Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC).

While at the time of moving out the former DPCC Chairman, Mr. Rajiv Talwar, the Government had handed over additional charge to the Secretary (Planning), Mr. Vivek Rai, but it is yet to appoint a regular incumbent to handle the affairs of the pollution control body which speaks volumes about the real intentions of the Government to deal with this menace which has become a concern of the common citizens as well as the courts.

While no doubts can be expressed about the intention of Mr. Rai or the way he would discharge his additional responsibility, but his commitment and the burden of work in the Planning Department leaves him little time to monitor the tedious work of the DPCC which is faced with new challenges in ensuring compliance of Supreme Court orders. In the absence of a regular DPCC chairman, the work of the organisation is suffering and action against water and air polluters has also come down drastically.

In fact, the functioning of the DPCC has come under strain since the departure of Mr. Talwar as many decisions has been left pending for days together as Mr. Rai is unable to attend office regularly. This has also resulted in a complete slowdown in action against the polluting industrial units. The zeal with which the industrial units and associations were being taken to task in no longer visible in the DPCC.

The DPCC received a further setback when one of its senior Environmental Engineer, Dr. Chander Prakash, was recently suspended. This comes after the suspension of another environmental engineer who was placed under suspension three months ago for demanding bribes from industrial units. That all is not well in the DPCC is clear from the fact that many of its officials have been found lax in dealing with the polluting units. No action is forthcoming in many cases where the ETPs are not functioning or have not been installed.

The situation is no better on the vehicle pollution front where the Transport Department has failed in its duty to ensure compliance of emission norms and running of eco-friendly vehicles on Delhi's roads. Vigilance on this front has been going down and an attitude of callousness and indifference has crept in is clear from the fact that the number of pollution checks have witnessed a drastic decline in the last three to four years.

According to official figures, the pollution checks for vehicles veered around 27 lakh in 1997. After this it started declining and touched 22 lakh in 1998. The situation deteriorated further in 1999 and the total pollution checks on vehicles touched 16 lakh. And for this year, it is estimated that the total checks have only reached 12 lakh by the end of September.

This despite the fact that the Transport Department has a complete line up of pollution control inspectors who are equipped with anti-pollution check vehicles. These vehicles and the inspectors have been lying idle for the past many months and a majority of the pollution control checks have been carried out by private authorised outlets at various petrol pumps.

Despite continued reprimand by the Apex Court on a number of occasions, the Delhi Government has failed to wake from its slumber.

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