Air pollution: SC asks Rajasthan's chief secy to appear

The Supreme Court today expressed displeasure over the failure of Rajasthan's chief secretary in filing an affidavit withdrawing the state's averment that the top court had passed an order banning use of pet coke and furnace oil without prior notice.
The court had passed an order on October 24 placing a ban on use of furnace oil and pet coke in states of Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Rajasthan from November 1.
Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana had on December 13 last year "volunteered" before the court to file affidavits of chief secretaries withdrawing the suggestion that the order was passed by the top court without prior notice to them.

The governments of Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Rajasthan have been sleeping like 'Kumbhakarna' and now they are "blaming" the court for passing orders banning use of pet coke and furnace oil in their states, the Supreme Court had said during the hearing on December 13.
When the matter came up for hearing today before a bench comprising Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta, it noted that no affidavit was filed by Rajasthan's chief secretary despite sufficient time granted for this purpose.
"It may be mentioned that the chief secretary of the state of Haryana and the chief secretary of the state of UP have already filed affidavits. Therefore, we are unable to understand why the chief secretary of the state of Rajasthan is unable to file an affidavit in time," the bench said.

"The chief secretary of the state of Rajasthan should be present in court on the next date of hearing to explain to us why he is not complying with the time requirements," the bench said and posted the matter for hearing on February 5.

During the hearing, Additional Solicitor General A N S Nadkarni, representing the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF), informed the bench that they have come out with notifications on pollution emission standards for 21 categories of industries in Delhi-national capital region.
He, however, said that the MoEF would file its affidavit giving all the details.

The bench also dealt with the issue of implementation of December 2015 emission standards for thermal power plants.
The court said it would hear thermal power plants matter on February 16.
The Centre had earlier informed the top court that the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) has issued a direction prohibiting the use of pet coke and furnace oil until further orders in the states of Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Haryana.
The use of pet coke and furnace oil is already prohibited in Delhi.
The court was hearing a PIL filed in 1985 by environmentalist M C Mehta who had raised the issue of air pollution in the Delhi-NCR.

Earlier, the court was told about the ill-effects of pet coke and furnace oil used in the industries on ambient air and it was said that emissions from such units were highly toxic as these discharged high sulphur content.