Delhi is turning into a gas chamber with the air quality index hitting the hazardous 400-500 ‘severe plus’ category. Schools have been shifted to online mode, companies forced to announce work-from-home for their employees, and heavy vehicles face restrictions.

Vivek Chattopadhyay, Principal Programme Manager, Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) talks to Surya S Pillai of The Statesman about the wider impact of air pollution, lack of political will to curb the menace and how health cost estimation is missing from the conversation surrounding the issue.

Q. Pollution is a crisis at many levels, be it the physical health, financial loss, or the overburdened medical infrastructure. How are we, as a nation, failing to deal with this apocalypse?

A. Today, we have various apparatus to gauge the air quality of a region, be it the AQI (air quality index), monitoring stations or other paraphernalia to get real time data. However, we are yet to take up the fight against pollution on a mission mode.

Similarly, health cost estimation is not part of the conversation on pollution. There is no concrete data to tell us how many people suffer from asthma or other cardiovascular diseases due to pollution. What is lacking is a holistic approach rather than city or state specific solutions. This ‘one state blaming other state’ mindset won’t bear fruit in the long run.

Q. Does the pollution issue need a political solution? Is environment degradation a direct result of the inability of our policy makers to address the issue?

A. Yes to an extent because until and unless our policy makers intervene passionately, the best of measures will remain only on paper. We recently flagged the issue of how the Centre’s National Clean Air Programme (NCAP) is getting reduced to a dust control initiative. The benchmark for assessing performance of cities is focused on PM 10 rather than the more harmful PM 2.5 pollutants.

Secondly, science has to be made more robust as there are many pollutants of varied nature contributing to air pollution. We need to have more scientists on pollution control boards. We also need to talk about ozone layer depletion which has the potential to cause far more dangerous consequences.

Talking about the role of political leaders to mitigate the crisis, Prime Minister Narendra Modi popularized ‘Swachch Bharat’ which caught our nation’s imagination. But I feel people only focused on cleaning their houses and dumping the garbage outside. What about the landfills? The mission was not just about visibly clean homes but a clean environment where everyone can co-exist.

Our political leaders never talk about environmental degradation during their election campaigning. They do not commit because they know they cannot do it.

Q. Delhi has literally turned into a gas chamber. Congress MP Shashi Tharoor recently questioned the national capital status of the city with regard to its non-livable conditions. Your comments?

A. Calcutta was the capital of British India and the industrial revolution was introduced in the country. Then Viceroy of India, Lord Curzon condemned the air pollution in the city and then came the Bengal Smoke Nuisances Act, 1905. So Tharoor’s remark on a ‘non-livable’ national capital is worth pondering about. Having said that, parliamentarians should raise the poignant issue of pollution rather than talking about shifting ‘national capital’ status because masses are not going anywhere. If any other city is made the national capital, only the bureaucrats will get to sit in a comparatively clean space. What difference will it make to the locals?

Q. Experts have long called for more efficient methods of tracking farm fires. They claim the current count of stubble burning incidents may be an underestimation. What do you say about this?
A. Tracking farm fires is solely dependent on satellite data, which is not an effective way to gauge the exact number of such incidents. India is largely dependent on NASA satellites and a few geo-stationary ones to get this data. All these do not provide the correct data because farmers usually align their stubble burning practice to evade the eyes of the satellites, thus bringing to the fore a major loophole. So satellite data should not be the only criteria.
Moreover, how can you lodge FIRs against farmers without any other proof? Thus, there should be another level of auditing for a constructive evaluation.
It is equally crucial to have a review along with a plan. The government should be indulgent enough to ask for farmers’ feedback. Why are they continuing to burn stubble when they know it is harmful for the environment and the soil? Poor farmers do not have an alternative, whereas the rich farmers are not held accountable.
The government should also step in and provide incentives for farmers willing to change their crop pattern, for instance, guaranteeing more MSP for millet cultivation which requires less water.

Q. An interesting 2016 study by the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) had said that there were smaller cities more polluted than Delhi with an air quality index (AQI) of more than 400. Does it hold true in 2024?
A. The air quality in smaller cities can be worse and we may not be aware about it because they are not in the spotlight. It is pointless to compare the same with the air quality index of Delhi because every city is different in terms of the nature of pollution. For instance, down south, the issue is combustion and not necessarily PM10.
Most importantly, we do not talk about the health damage pollution causes to the people of various cities. People do not realize that trouble arises when the pollution levels go from low to high, in other words, the phase in between.

Q. Should air pollution be declared a national emergency? If yes, will there be any difference in the outcome?
A. If a majority of Indian cities are getting featured in the Top 100 world pollutants, it must ring a bell. According to the Global Burden of Diseases (GBD) study, pollution kills more people annually than the COVID pandemic. It is high time we wake up from our slumber and pull our socks up.