Amid concerns over Delhi's growing pollution levels, the government on Wednesday said it has decided to put in place a unified air quality monitoring system to ensure that "authenticated" information is available to people even as green bodies asked the government to make their intent behind "reevaluating" the pollution data public.
Amid concerns over Delhi's growing pollution levels, the government on Wednesday said it has decided to put in place a unified air quality monitoring system to ensure that "authenticated" information is available to people even as green bodies asked the government to make their intent behind "reevaluating" the pollution data public.
The Union Environment Ministry said the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC) and IMD - the three agencies monitoring air quality in Delhi - have also developed a Standard Operating Procedure (SoP) of data "validation, analysis and dissemination" and gave comprehensive details as to how it would work.
Shortly after the move, Greenpeace India said that the the government needs to make their intent behind reevaluating the pollution data public. "MoEF (Environment Ministry) together with MoES (Ministry of Earth Sciences) and DPCC have decided to put in position a unified system of air quality monitoring in Delhi to ensure authenticated air quality information to the public at large, given that three agencies - CPCB, DPCC and IMD monitor air quality," an official statement said.
This comes after a joint meeting, chaired by Shailesh Nayak, Secretary, Ministry of Earth Sciences, was held to Wednesday which was attended by officials of Environment Ministry, CPCB, DPCC and IMD. "The government needs to make their intent behind reevaluating the pollution data public. If at all they are trying to fudge data, it will be a defeating purpose for themselves as there will be questions raised by environment monitoring groups who are simultaneously tracking pollution levels," Aishwarya Madineni, Campaigner, Greenpeace India said.
She added that India is still in denial about the alarming pollution levels in the national capital. "Our government should take the learning from China in terms of how the city is already moving ahead. It's pollution levels have reduced, they have put in place a 5-year plan, monitoring systems and an alarm system (to warn of high pollution levels)," she said.
Also Read: Delhi air has unacceptable levels of pollution: Study
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