New Delhi (The Hawk): For air pollution abatement and control in Delhi / NCR, the Commission for Air Quality Management in NCR and Adjoining Areas, constituted in 2021, has devised a comprehensive policy for air pollution abatement in NCR in July 2022, stipulating sector-specific action points quantifying targets along with timelines and implementation plan by various agencies in NCR States. The policy framework details sector-wise interventions, quantified targets and timelines for various sectors contributing to air pollution.
Since its inception, the Commission has so far issued 78 directions and 11 advisories, besides executive orders to various agencies concerned in the NCR including State Governments of Punjab, GNCTD, and various bodies of the Central and State Governments in the region.
Besides, to address the issue of generally adverse Air quality witnessed in the winter, actions under 'Graded Response Action Plan' are also invoked based on AQI. The GRAP calls for a set of emergent preventive/restrictive actions depending on air pollution levels, to be implemented by the identified agencies for combating the adverse air quality scenario generally prevailing in Delhi-NCR owing to unfavourable climatic and meteorological conditions during the winter months.
The Commission has also constituted a statutory sub-Committee on Safeguarding and Enforcement represented by senior level functionaries of the NCR State Governments towards effective implementation and monitoring of field-level actions envisaged in the policy and various statutory Directions/ orders of the Commission.
The Government has also launched National Clean Air Programme (NCAP) in 2019 as a national level strategy to reduce air pollution levels across the country. Taking into account the available international experiences and national studies, the tentative national level target under NCAP is 20%–30% reduction of particulate matter concentration by 2024.
131 million plus/non-attainment cities (cities exceeding National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS), consecutively for five years) have been identified, including six cities of Delhi-NCR (Faridabad, Alwar, Meerut, Ghaziabad, Noida and Delhi). Accordingly, City Specific Clean Air Action Plans have been prepared and rolled out for implementation in 131 non-attainment/million plus cities to improve the air quality. These action plans have short, medium and long term actions for city-specific air polluting sources like soil & road dust, vehicles, domestic fuel, MSW burning, construction material and industries along with the responsible agencies.
An amount of ~Rs 9650 Cr has been released to the identified 131 cities from FY 2019-20 till FY 2023-24 (till 15th Dec) under NCAP. Out of ~ Rs 9650 Cr, an amount of Rs 1292.50 Cr has been released to cities which are funded under NCAP, out of which Rs 480.92 Cr has been utilised (till 15th Dec) and Rs 8357.51 Cr has been released to the cities that are funded under Fifteenth Finance Commission (XV-FC), out of which Rs5835.03 Cr (till 15th Dec) has been utilised for improvement in air quality.
The details of release and utilisation of funds in 131 cities under National Clean Air Programme, including the cities falling in Delhi NCR, for FY 2019-20 to 2023-24 are enclosed as Annexure I.
Further, steps taken for improvement of air quality in India from different sources is enclosed at Annexure-II.
