With air pollution continuing to be at its worse in the national capital for a week now, smog tower installed near Connaught Place became operational on Wednesday following Supreme Court’s order.
Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai thanked the apex court for the instructions to start the smog tower, and further added that government has issued an order to the concerned authorities to run the smog tower installed at Connaught Place at its full capacity by Thursday.
Speaking to media, the minister also informed that a total of 611 teams have been constituted by the Delhi government to check the burning of waste or any matter out in the open and also biomass burning.
Rai also thanked the apex court for ordering the publication of real-time study data on the city’s pollution.
According to reports, the tower will improve the air quality of the area up to a couple of hundred meters surrounding the tower by reducing pollutants such as PM 2.5 and PM 10 to some extent.
It is DPCC chairman Ashwani Kumar who ordered the shutting down of the smog tower and stopping of the Realtime Source Apportionment Study (RSAS) with regard to Delhi’s pollution, Rai had said earlier.
Reportedly, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kerjriwal recommended suspension of DPCC chief to Lieutenant Governor V K Saxena for allegedly stopping the special Realtime Source Apportionment Study (RSAS) on Delhi’s air pollution and also shutting down a smog tower.
Not long ago, in the last week of October, Environment Minister Gopal Rai had requested the Delhi CM to suspend Kumar, alleging that the senior IAS officer had stopped the RSAS, which was crucial in solving Delhi’s pollution problem.