Holistic improvement in air quality one of government’s top priority, says Environment Minister

Tribune News Service
New Delhi, September 7

Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav inaugurated what he called the national capital’s “first functional smog tower” at Anand Vihar to mark the Second International Day of Clean Air for Blue Skies.

Last month, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal also inaugurated a smog tower at Connaught Place.

A smog tower is a structure designed as large/medium scale air purifiers to reduce air pollution, usually by forcing the air through filters. It comes ahead of the period in Delhi when pollution levels rise due to various local and other factors, like stubble burning by farmers in neighbouring states.

At Tuesday’s inauguration, Yadav said he hoped that the smog tower would help supplement the efforts to improve Delhi’s air quality and said the central government had launched several initiatives to improve air quality across the country, with the Prime Minister himself setting a goal for holistic improvement in air quality in more than 100 cities.

“Eighty-six cities showed better air quality in 2019 in comparison to 2018, which increased to 104 cities in 2020”, he said at the event that also saw the launch of a portal named ‘PRANA” – Portal for Regulation of Air-pollution in Non-Attainment cities under the National Clean Air Programme (NCAP)’,” he said.

NCAP targets 20 per cent to 30 per cent reduction in Particulate Matter (PM10 and PM2.5) by 2024 across the country, officials said. The portal will support tracking of physical as well as financial status of city air action plan implementation and disseminate information on air quality to public, according to officials.

So far, Rs 375.44 crore have been released to 114 cities during FY 2019-20 & 2020-21 for initiating actions under city action plan.

Further, Rs 4400 core have been released to 42 cities with million plus population as per recommendations of 15th Finance Commission report for FY 2020-21. This is in addition to funds available through various central and state government schemes, they added.