Congress hits out at CM Gupta over remarks on pollution

Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee president Devender Yadav on Saturday criticised Chief Minister Rekha Gupta for her remarks on the city’s air pollution crisis, calling them insensitive and a refusal to accept accountability.

Reacting to Gupta’s statement that “pollution is 27 years problem and at least 27 months should be given to us to curb it”, Yadav said such comments reflect poor leadership. “Statements like ‘pollution is an inherited problem’, ‘can lockdown be imposed, will it work?’, ‘27 saal ka gandh hai pollution, humein 27 mahine to do’ are irresponsible, short-sighted and an escape from responsibilities,” he added.

Yadav pointed out that despite BJP’s long presence in Delhi’s governance structure, pollution continues to remain severe. “There is a BJP government at the Centre since 2014, there was a BJP rule in the Municipal Corporation of Delhi from 2007 to 2022 and the BJP has been in power in Delhi for the last 10 months as well as in the corporation once again for eight months, but the problem of pollution has not been solved,” he said.

Calling the BJP’s efforts “event management”, Yadav said the government was failing to implement effective action plans.