Javadekar Says 4% Pollution From Stubble Burning, Gopal Rai Asks What Did Delhi Do In 15 Days

A war of words has broken out between the Union Government and the Delhi Government over the rising pollution In the national capital.

This after Union Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar said stubble burning contributes only 4 per cent of pollutants in the environment of Delhi. "Rest is due to local factors like dust, construction and biomass burning So, 50 teams of the Central Pollution Control Board will be deployed for inspection in Delhi-NCR from today," he said.

AFP

Javadekar said this while flagging off 50 Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) inspection teams for field visits in Delhi-NCR to keep a watch on pollution hot spots.

Responding to Javadekar Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai alleged that the Centre has become "spokesperson" of the neighbouring states where crop residues are being burnt.

Rai asked the Union minister what possibly the residents of Delhi could have done in the past 15 days to catapult the air quality to a "very poor" level.

AFP

"It seems the Centre has become a spokesperson of the states where stubble burning takes place. Delhi government is taking measures to fight the pollution in the national capital and wants cooperation from the Centre to tackle these outside sources," said Rai.

War of words

He added the Union environment minister said that stubble burning contributes only 4 per cent to the pollution in Delhi. "Air Quality Index was normal 15 days ago; I want to ask him as to what the people of Delhi did in 15 days, which led to this kind of situation," said Rai.

Rai also said the contribution from stubble burning is, in fact, 44% based on CPCB¡¯s data.

AFP

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal tweeted saying, ¡°Staying in denial will not help. If stubble burning causes only 4% pollution, then why has pollution suddenly increased last fortnite? Air was clean before that. Same story every yr. There¡¯s no massive jump in any local source of pollution in last few days to cause this spike?¡±.

Lets accept that stubble burning causes huge pollution every yr in North India during this time. And lets all together find a soln sincerely. Blame game and politics hasn¡¯t helped anyone. People r suffering. I am extremely worried that pollution will play havoc coupled wid corona

¡ª Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) October 15, 2020

Following the controversy, the MoEFCC issued a clarification saying that Javadekar was referring to the contribution of stubble burning only for this year, which is 4% till now. Last year, it was much higher.

BCCL

The ministry also tweeted, ¡°Share of Stubble burning changes every day. Last year, between 08 Oct-09 Dec, the share of Stubble burning in #AirPollution in Delhi (as per SAFAR data), was greater than 15% on six days, while on a single day it was greater than 40%.¡±