Delhi-NCR faces an impending air quality crisis as Diwali approaches, according to environmentalist Vimlendu Jha of Swechha India. Key issues discussed include assigning blame, with factors like vehicles, industries, and burning of crop residue all contributing. Jha emphasizes the need for urgent, coordinated action by authorities, industries, and citizens to tackle the severe pollution levels.
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#DelhiNCR #SwechhaIndia #Diwali #DelhiNCR #Pollution #AQI #DelhiPollutionnews #Delhinews #Oneindia #Oneindianews
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NewsTranscript
00:00Hello and welcome to this special discussion on the deteriorating air quality index in
00:11the national capital and the adjoining NCR. It's not a new thing. I know it's not a new
00:16thing. It's not news anymore. Something is that we need to look beyond. What are the
00:22reasons? How can we counter it? What are our responsibilities? Where does the buck stop?
00:28All these things. To look beyond, today we are joined by Vimlindu Jha. He is an environmentalist
00:34and founder of Swecha India. Vimlindu, thank you so much for speaking to OneIndia.
00:42Thank you, Pankaj. It's a pleasure indeed.
00:44Pleasure. Vimlindu, as I mentioned, this whole brouhaha over the air quality index at times
00:54takes the debate away from the core issue. In your opinion, what are the primary sources
01:01that are driving this alarming rise in pollution levels across Delhi and NCR, first of all?
01:07And how can immediate measures target these contributors effectively?
01:13First of all, I'll answer the last question that there's no immediate measures. It's high
01:19time that we actually go beyond band-aid solution to problems like air pollution. And therefore,
01:26we should not focus on immediate because what happens that immediate solution
01:30or chasing immediate band-aid solutions is the main problem also. But coming back to your first
01:38part of the question, which was about what are the main sources? So largely, there are two sources
01:42of pollution or two categories of sources of air pollution that we talked about in Delhi NCR. One
01:47is the perennial sources of pollution, which is basically by perennial, I mean,
01:52pollution that happens throughout the year, right? So vehicle pollution, for example, almost
01:5725 to 30 percent of the contribution to ambient air quality or in terms of pollution is of
02:03vehicular pollution, be it the private cars that we're talking about or the trucks that we have
02:08or other vehicles, or it could be the two wheelers that we have in lakhs in Delhi NCR.
02:16Second main source of perennial source of pollution is dust. And when we talk about dust,
02:22then we're talking about construction demolition dust, and also the roadside dust. So we're
02:26actually looking at Delhi is always under construction or Delhi NCR, there's always
02:31some form of repair that's always on when the authorities, be it private authorities or
02:37government authorities, remember to dig the road, but they don't remember to actually plaster it
02:43back, or fix that pavement or fix that cabling work that they've done, or similarly, the demolition
02:50or construction activities that keeps happening. And the third source, the perennial
02:55source is open burning of garbage, be it the roadside burning of garbage, the landfills that
03:00are constantly on fire that we're talking about in Delhi NCR, be it in Ghazipur or Balasore,
03:06or in other places. And then there are also in Delhi NCR region, there are
03:12there are industries and there are thermal power plants in the 300 kilometer radius.
03:16And these are the four or five sources of pollution. That is the main reason of main cause
03:23why Delhi's AQI on an average is almost 200 to 250. Indeed, now when we talk about every
03:30time there's a conversation around air pollution, the most convenient argument that is put forth,
03:36even irresponsibly by the Supreme Court of our country, is that Parali is the main source.
03:44So we have to understand that other than the perennial sources, there are periodic,
03:50occasional, episodic sources of pollution and open burning of Parali that we're talking about,
03:56or farm fires that we talk about, or the firecrackers that will take place in Diwali
04:00or in Dhanteras or otherwise, these are episodic sources of pollution that makes the situation
04:06worse. But the moment you build your entire narrative of the problem and the solution,
04:12only around the episodic sources of pollution, then you're doing a grave injustice to the actual
04:18problem, which is the lack of public transport, which is lack of governance around dust management,
04:25be it the roadside dust or construction, demolition activities, you know, then we're doing
04:29injustice to in our understanding of open burning of garbage. So these are the varied sources. And
04:36by the way, this is not just in a lot of times, the conversation is of Delhi's AQI, it's a regional
04:41problem, AQI, air doesn't have a political boundary, as in, imagine, in fact, you know,
04:47farm fires of Lahore actually pollutes the air of Amritsar as well. So it's not as if, you know,
04:53we can actually seal our boundaries, national boundary or interstate boundary in that sense.
04:58So that's the problem. A lot of our focus in terms of air pollution governance has been in those
05:03immediate, you know, solutions to find, be it creating the smoke towers or switch on, switch off.
05:10These are mostly PR gimmicks, rather than ecological long term solutions to a grave
05:17public health crisis called air pollution in Delhi NCR.
05:21Well, Mehterji, I would definitely say you have touched upon a lot of aspects which are very much
05:27they are staring at our faces as we speak. It has often been seen that there is a human tendency,
05:35if we can put a human or an inhuman face to this pollution,
05:40we don't react until the problem is knocking at our doorstep.
05:44You have repeatedly mentioned periodic problems, be it Diwali or Parali, which happen at a particular
05:49time and are a continuous source of pollution.
05:52At this point of time, during this year, normally AQI starts making headlines in the winter season.
06:03Do you believe that there's some sense of apathy also? And I'm not just talking about
06:07government apathy, I'm talking about, you know, our communities, our own neighborhood and backyard.
06:14Do you think that that is also something that needs to be looked into and to be worked upon?
06:19Absolutely, Pankaj. So if you look at, you know, in many other countries,
06:24many other parts of the world, when the air quality index reaches 200 or 250,
06:30the cities are shut down, cities are evacuated, because it is considered to be completely unsafe
06:36and unsafe, especially for the elderly, pregnant women and children. And here we are,
06:43as I'm very, very sure the next week, the air quality index will actually be crossing 999.
06:49999 in several parts of Delhi, it's already 450 in various parts and in Bihar and many other parts,
06:57the 13 hotspots that we talked about. But we have normalized it for us as in this is just a number,
07:02when the entire document, you know, the media or the scientific community or the doctors tell us
07:09the impact, long term impact that it has in terms of life expectancy, be it or how, you know,
07:15one in three children in Delhi are actually suffering from some pulmonological disorder or
07:21the other. So your life, your morbidity, and your mortality both gets affected. But we as a
07:28society, and it gets very convenient for the government also, because then the government
07:32doesn't have to really feel embarrassed about it. As a society, we have normalized 400, 450, 500
07:39AQI. So there is civic apathy, there's almost ignorance. And also we speak up or we at least
07:48pretend to speak up only in the month of November, when the pollution is visible,
07:55you know, because of meteorological conditions, we need to understand that as if
07:59suddenly the pollution increases, there's more farm fire or there's more vehicles that have been
08:04brought into Delhi. It's just that because of meteorological conditions and geographical
08:09disadvantage that Delhi has, and, you know, low wind speed that we talk about right now,
08:15the direction of farm fire, and the wind from the northern states, a lot of those factors,
08:22dip in temperature, those are the factors because of which the AQI, which otherwise is around 250,
08:28300. And in other times of the year, the pollution gets displaced. So pollution
08:34displace as much, pollution flows away. So we say that there is no pollution,
08:38because of geographical and meteorological conditions, it is not spread out,
08:42so we see it, and at that time, we start discussing a few things.
08:51I was visiting the banks of river Yamuna from the Kalindi Kun side,
08:57and just as a precursor to pollution, there is Yamuna Froth that makes headlines.
09:03Unfortunately, it makes headlines at the same time of the year, when Chhatt Pooja
09:08comes into picture, and then there is a media gathering there. We also became a part of it,
09:12we also went there. Mr. Vimrandu, let me tell you, I wasn't able to stand there for very long.
09:18We spent around a couple of hours there speaking to the people, the young volunteers,
09:23and others who had come there to take a quick look at what is the scenario.
09:30But what I realized is that as long as there is no constant problem at our doorstep,
09:39as a society and as a government, we don't pay attention to it. It's a very long shot
09:46to have air pollution as one of the election issues.
09:58If the air quality touches 200, I mean, people stop their vehicles, they come to cycling,
10:03even if they have to travel.
10:08In your opinion, what could be the message, what could be the steps that you and I can take,
10:15at least to curtail it, to counter it?
10:45Largely, I think we need to really understand the first part that you rightly said,
11:01that we need to make this a political issue, make this an electoral issue.
11:15This is no more just a romantic environmental crisis that environmentalists
11:22write about and speak about and discuss in conferences, it's actually become a public
11:26health issue, because every second household has an asthma patient or a cancer patient,
11:31or intestinal disorder or gastro disorder person. So when you have a public health crisis,
11:38which affects your overall performance and overall life expectancy, then the government
11:43better take cognizance. Of course, the only institution in the country that has taken
11:48somewhat cognizance of this, which is not its responsibility primarily is the courts of our
11:53country, like governance is not a job of the Supreme Court, or the high courts of our country.
12:00But you know, anything that we see that has happened in the name of environmental governance
12:05in the country in the last 20-30 years is primarily because there is a danda from the
12:10courts of our country. Whether we talk about CNG, or we talk about CAQ, GRAP 1, GRAP 2,
12:15GRAP 3, all these campaigns, even if there has been pressure, it is because of the courts.
12:22So if we have to find a solution to this, we will have to find a comprehensive, collaborative,
12:29systemic solution. For this, we can all, the government, we and you can save,
12:37If I am having trouble breathing, then I can't wait for a government program,
12:46because I don't know if the government will be established in 10 years or not. So a lot of times we say that,
12:51you know, unfortunately, if people can avoid exposure to air pollution, one should do that.
12:58But again, this is a very elitist concept that we should not leave the house.
13:03We and you, suppose we are talking on Zoom, we can do work from home, but a rickshaw driver,
13:09a milkman, a vegetable vendor, a farmer, and a factory worker, they don't have work from home.
13:16Majority of people can't, you know, when the government's advisory comes that work from home,
13:23avoid it, then what will be the financial loss? You block construction activities,
13:28and all the lakhs of workers who come on the streets, and their daily income is enough to feed their stomachs,
13:35we completely tell them that in the name of pollution, you will be blocked from your basic source of livelihood.
13:41So we will have to really look at this from the lens of environmental justice also,
13:47because pollution affects the poor the most. We feel that this is the air,
13:53everything is the same, it is very uniform, it is the same for everyone, whether he is the prime minister or someone else,
13:59the air is not the same, that is not the case. The air of our rich people is different, the air of the poor is different,
14:05exposure to air is different. Second, exposure to, you know, the remedies when you are actually suffering because of air pollution,
14:13there also there is a problem of environmental justice. Poor people don't have access to an air purifier,
14:19don't have access to work from home, don't have access to luxury of going to a fancy hospital and get themselves treated.
14:27You know, there's a ward that's been made in some of the government hospitals right now and last year as well,
14:33a pollution ward, so there are ICUs for pollution, which is good, but again, that can't be, you know,
14:39you don't have to find a solution to the end of the pipe, you have to find a solution to the beginning of the pipe.
14:45Absolutely. In the beginning, we do pollution and then we spray it. What is happening in Yamuna right now,
14:51you are putting chemicals in a completely toxic river and you are hiding it by spraying it with water.
15:01The main problem of Yamuna is the perennial pollution or the quality of water that actually exists and not necessarily the froth.
15:07Similarly, in air quality, it's not the smog that you see, it's the air that is not just necessarily,
15:15the visual should not be the only alarming statistics for our citizens, it should be the quality of air and quality of water.
15:23Absolutely, it gives me immense pleasure, you know, to have spoken to you, to have understood that there are so many people and voices
15:31who are very seriously approaching this and media plays a very vital role and it should be asking the right questions
15:39and promoting the good deeds done by lots of youngsters whom I met during my visit to the banks of river Yamuna differently.
15:49One final question, I see Swetha India is what, you know, you are the founder for.
15:55Swetha is also related to cleanliness and when I was saying, where does the bug stop, I feel that it is our responsibility.
16:03Tell us about Swetha, about Swetha India.
16:06Swetha is our responsibility and responsibility is personal responsibility which is individual responsibility
16:13and at the same time, collective social responsibility talks about both.
16:17For the last 25 years, on different issues, whether it is air pollution or Yamuna issues,
16:24we work on it and there are two types of approaches.
16:2750% of our energy goes to collaborative solution to these crises, which is where we work with young people,
16:35work in schools and communities in terms of finding solutions to many of these environmental problems
16:42or climate change related problems that we're talking about.
16:45We do research, awareness or hand-holding work or exposure work that we actually do
16:50and the 50% of our energy also goes in somewhat confrontation and asking those difficult questions of people who are responsible for it
16:57because in a healthy civil society, it's very, very important that we just don't become status quoist
17:03but we'll have to break the status quo and that's where Swetha takes pride in playing that role of being advocate
17:10and asking those hard, difficult, uncomfortable questions of the government, of the courts or of people in power.
17:19That's what Swetha does through the year.
17:22Absolutely, we have to walk this road ourselves or Swetha, as you said,
17:27if you don't walk on your own, you will fall.
17:30There is a situation like this that until you don't walk on your own, you won't be able to give the clear picture.
17:36Mr. Vimlandhu, an environmentalist and also founder of Swetha India, thank you very much for talking to us.
17:42We end up learning more from you and people like you.
17:48Thank you. Thank you, Pankajit. It was a pleasure.