Clean up: Air, water crises in Delhi demand better fund deployment

Deteriorating pollution — air, water, and noise — in India has created headlines all over the world for several years in a row. In the light of this dismal reality, a parliamentary panel’s findings that the environment ministry spent less than 1 per cent of the Rs 858 crore allocated for the pollution-control fund in 2024-25 is concerning. More disturbing perhaps, when the alarm bells are ringing over the rapidly increasing severity of air pollution in Indian cities, is the committee’s “shocked” discovery that the money allocated for “Control of Pollution”, which accounts for a little over 27 per cent of the ministry’s allocation, remains underutilised. The official reason offered for this spending deficit is the lack of approval for the continuation of the scheme, which has set ambitious targets, even as the financial year draws to a close, suggesting inadequate concern and planning about this issue.

 

The “Control of Pollution” scheme was launched in 2018 to monitor the three kinds of pollution across India, and is fully funded by the government. Central to the programme is the government’s National Clean Air Programme (Ncap). The Ncap aimed to reduce particulate matter 10 (PM 10) in 131 cities to the extent of 40 per cent by 2026 over 2019-20 levels. Overall, Rs 3,072 crore has been allocated for this scheme between 2019-20 and 2025-26. Ministry officials say a raft of programmes are ready and will be rolled out as soon as the requisite approvals are in. As yet, no explanation has been given either to the parliamentary panel or Parliament as to why approvals have not been forthcoming for such a scheme, especially when pollution in Indian cities on all counts has touched crisis levels.

 

Much has been made of the fact that India saw an improvement in the World Air Quality report on the rankings for 2024 from third to fifth, with the concentration of PM 2.5, considered the most harmful for health, falling from 54.5 to 50.6 micrograms (one microgram is one-thousandth of a milligram) per cubic metre, though this is still way above the World Health Organization level of 5 to 15 micrograms per cubic metre. Moreover, this aggregate number did not prevent the country from harbouring 13 of the world’s 20 most polluted cities, with India’s capital city, New Delhi, ranking second. The fact that the “improvement” in India’s ranking is on account of outperforming such countries as Chad, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and the Democratic Republic of Congo on the pollution rankings can scarcely be considered a cause for celebration. Though air pollution attracts most of the attention, India faces a catastrophic water-pollution crisis, with the NITI Aayog highlighting India ranks 120th out of 122 countries on the Global Water Quality Index. Almost 70 per cent of Indian water sources are contaminated.

 

The public-health crisis precipitated by bad air and water alone demands that pollution-control programmes be a continuous exercise, brooking no procedural delays such as approvals. This could be the lesson for the Delhi government, run by the Bharatiya Janata Party. Presenting the Budget on Monday, the Delhi chief minister said the city’s air and water pollution were top priorities as she announced an impressive outlay of Rs 506 crore for the environment and forest department, and the outlay included work on improving quality-control systems for air and water. Managing this process efficiently will, however, remain the challenge.