What are we doing to prevent air pollution in Mumbai: Bombay HC

The approach to tackle air pollution in Mumbai cannot be remedial anymore it has to be preventive the Bombay High Court said on Monday describing the situation in the city as ldquoemergentrdquoA division bench of Chief Justice D K Upadhyaya and Justice G S Kulkarni said the law and rules on air pollution were in place but now their implementation was requiredWhile the air quality index in the city may be satisfactory it will return to being poor or in the worse category in a few months it saidThe court was hearing a bunch of petitions and one it had taken up on its own on the rising air pollution in the city in December last yearThe court on Monday noted that industries and public projects must be frequently monitored and inspected to ensure compliance with air pollution norms and rulesldquoWe have the law and rules What is required is implementation There has to be a permanent and robust mechanism to ensure implementationrdquo the court saidldquoNow we have to change the approach It cannot be remedial it has to be preventive The approach now cannot be that you are thirsty so you dig a well Now these are emergent situationsrdquo the bench saidldquoUltimately what we find is everything is in place on paper Guidelines are thereenactments are therestill why are we facing all thisrdquo the court questionedThe bench further noted that passing mechanical orders will not helpldquoWe should have a statutory mechanism to address all this instead of involving the courtrdquo it saidThe court said the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board MPCB was dutybound to ensure all industries and public project sites comply with the norms and rules There has to be frequent monitoring and inspection it saidldquoThe problem is during night time emission from industries is more causing air pollution in the morningrdquo the court saidIn the past industries were generally located outside town or city limits but with development residential structures have come up around such establishments the court saidldquoDoes the state government have any policy by which industries can be shifted to certain other zonesrdquo Justice Kulkarni questionedAdvocate General Birendra Saraf appearing for the government informed the bench that in accordance with earlier orders an inspection was carried out at seven public project sites and certain shortcomings were foundThese projects include road concreting at Bandra and Khar the bullet train site at the BandraKurla Complex the VersovaBandra Sealink Mumbai Metro III Mumbai Coastal Road and the Mumbai Trans Harbour LinkldquoCertain shortcomings were found and the norms were not strictly enforced but now everything is in place All the shortcomings have been addressedrdquo Saraf told the courtThe bench directed the MPCB to start the audit of industries in the state immediatelyThe court posted the matter for further hearing on June 20This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever