Focus on pollution

NCR needs an effective regulator

Even as the government gives an unceremonious burial to the Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) for the National Capital Region (NCR) of Delhi by allowing the Ordinance to lapse, a Swiss environment agency has identified the NCR as the world’s most polluted region. The World Air Quality Report, 2020, put out by the Swiss air technology organisation, IQAir, reveals that 22 of the world’s 30 most polluted cities, including 14 in the top 15, are in India, mostly in the north. All the cities sharing borders with Delhi, and many others in its vicinity in the NCR, figure among