MPs, bureaucrats skip Parliamentary Standing Committee meeting on air pollution

Even as the Supreme Court pulled up agencies over worsening air quality in the national capital, officers from the agencies responsible for tackling air pollution on Friday chose to be absent from an important meeting called by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Urban Development here.

The meeting was finally called off.

According to sources, prominent among those who were missing from the meeting were Vice Chairman of the Delhi Development Authority (DDA), Commissioners of three Municipal Corporations of Delhi (MCD) and most importantly Secretary, Environment, Forest and Climate Change Ministry.

BJP MP from East Delhi Gautam Gambhir was also absent. Out of 29 MPs, only four of them were present in the meeting today. Chairman Jagdambika Pal, AAP MP Sanjay Singh, National Conference (NC) MP Hasnain Masoodi and BJP MP CR Patil were present to attend today's meeting.

Sources said the chairman of the committee and other members who attended the meeting have taken a serious note of their absence and have decided to write to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla about them.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) in a statement said the ministry was represented by Deputy Secretary and also from the Central Pollution Control Board.

The Joint Secretary could not attend the meeting as she was to appear for an important matter in the Supreme Court.

"Detailed notes were submitted to the Ministry of Urban Development prior as was asked," said an official spokesperson of MoEFCC.