India’s vast population, and gas emissions due to vehicles and manufacturing plants has lead to 14 cities in India ranking among the world’s polluted.
10 cities in India are on very high levels of Particulate Matter (PM2.5) which are – Faridabad, Gaya, Agra, Patna, Muzaffarpur, Srinagar, Gurgaon, Jaipur, Patiala and Jodhpur.
The problems with pollution are lung cancer, heart diseases, asthma, and even strokes.
India records 1.1 million people dying every year due to air pollution. Hence the Indian government is taking measures such as the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana scheme which hopes to give support to such systems as the LPG connections.
Delhi was seen to be facing major issues with even a cricket match being stopped due to the pollution. Levels of dangerous particles in Delhi are 10 times higher than the safe limit.
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Last year in November, the smog in Delhi was so bad that it was a public holiday as the fog was a mixture of vehicular pollution, construction and road dust.
The Supreme Court is seen to put a lot of pressure on the Central government to look into the problem.
There is a Comprehensive Action Plan (CAP) which include control of vehicle emission and dusts from places of new constructions. This needs to be further implemented around India and not just Delhi.
India should look closely at China, which even though being the most populated country in the world has done very well
The mayors of Handan in Hebei province and Jincheng and Yangquan in Shanxi province were given orders to account for their actions against smogs. These type of meetings help control and check what is being implemented. The Ministry of Ecology and Environment in Beijing is solving environmental issues.
Jincheng for example is known as a major coal and gas city which the mayor, Liu Feng said he would ‘rather sacrifice GDP growth’ in order to reduce air pollution. This has already been seen where Jincheng’s gross domestic product has fallen by 9% as a result of production curbs.
