Women's Safety, Deforestation & Pollution: AAP's Raghav Chadha Addresses Issues That Matter To The Youth

Moving beyond the grandiloquence of communal politics and rabid nationalism, India's youth, who constitute 65 per cent of the total population, are facing issues that either do not make it to the manifestos of the political parties or are mentioned in a way that seems unimportant.

For the millennial of this country, pollution, healthcare and deforestation are as big an issue as unemployment, education and taxes.

By 2020, youth will make up 34 per cent of the country＊s population with a median age of 27.9 years. Forty-five million young people, having becoming eligible to vote as they turned 18, have been added to the country＊s electoral roll since 2014, says an Election Commission data 每 meaning the voter list has been expanded by 5 per cent since 2014.

How young India votes will clearly be one of the conclusive factors in the upcoming Lok Sabha Elections 2019, the first-phase polling in which begins April 11.

Indian youth is of the opinion that instead of focusing on communities and religion, the political parties need to focus on reducing pollution and reining in the environment crisis along with ensuring women＊s safety, better education opportunities and good governance.

We asked Raghav Chadha, the 30-year-old Aam Aadmi Party＊s MP candidate from South Delhi and party's national spokesperson, questions that matter to the millennial:

Pollution is perhaps the most crucial issue for the people of this country, especially New Delhi in North India. How AAP plans to ensure that Delhites breathe clean air?

Raghav Chadha: Pollution is not a Delhi-specific issue but a prominent issue in North India. The air quality between March to October is ＆Average＊ to ＆Moderate＊ and suddenly between October end and November first week, it becomes ＆Bad＊, even ＆Severe＊. The huge number of factories, vehicles, landfills is relatively constant. Yet there is a massive decline in air quality and it＊s essentially because of factors that are beyond direct control of the government. Stubble burning from neighbouring states of Punjab and Haryana are contributors towards severe air quality in Delhi-NCR. Another factor is duststorms in the neighbouring state of Rajasthan due to which the entire north Indian-belt reels under poor air quality.

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This happened last year too and airports were forced to shut down due to low visibility. The limited point I＊m trying to make here is that pollution doesn＊t understand boundaries or territorial jurisdictions. The pollution has less to do with the number of vehicles on road and this is proved by a recent IIT study, which states that vehicular pollution is just a small contributor to bad air quality in Delhi.

It is up to the governments in the states that can start taking note of such issue. So far, the only government in the country out of those in 25 states that has shown some will power to deal with the problem of air pollution is the Delhi Government.

The Delhi government came out with measures like Odd-Even, banning construction activities, installation of air purifiers, monitoring air quality index at most places in Delhi. All these measures show that we have got the willpower and we are trying to do the best in what we can do to curb the menace of air pollution in Delhi.

We need support from other states as well. A meeting was called in December and was headed by the Dr Harsh Vardhan, union environment minister, and all neighbouring states were invited. Only one minister showed up at the meeting and he was from Delhi government. No representative turned up from the states like Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan. The incident shows the intent of the Aam Aadmi Party and that how we are committed to resolving this issue.

Women＊s safety in Delhi is still considered a joke. A lot was promised to make Delhi safer for women, yet shocking headlines from the capital have failed to stop the dangers that women in Delhi face. How can the situation be made better?

Raghav Chadha: In Delhi, the law and order enforcement agency, the Delhi Police, is not under the ambit of Delhi government. As far as the enforcement of the law and ensuring security to women is concerned, the prime responsibility of that happens to be with the Delhi Police that reports to the Indian government and not the Delhi government. Having said that, the Aam Aadmi Party has tried to do whatever it can in this respect. The Delhi government has installed CCTV cameras at every nook and corner, every chaupal, every koocha of Delhi. Every lane and every colony is secured with CCTV cameras.

We have taken up initiatives like deploying bus marshals in every DTC bus and sensitising people on safety and security of women - whether it is having special classes for students in Delhi government schools over safety measures - the Delhi government is right at the helm of it.

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We are working on improving last mile connectivity so that women here face less transportation issues.

We say that we will, just how with the set of same principals we have revolutionised the education sector in Delhi, we will be able to revolutionise law and order in Delhi too. The Delhi Police will be made accountable to the people of Delhi. The law and order in Delhi is going to be the best in the world if Delhi gets full statehood.

Thousands of trees were cut in Delhi-NCR for developmental projects. There were massive protests too. What does your party and how you, as a candidate, plan to increase green cover in the capital, or at least ensure that no more trees are cut?

Raghav Chadha: The Central government indulged into large-scale deforestation in Delhi. The government of Delhi has tried to stop such unholy attempts by the government 每 the case in point being the NBCC, where the government constructed flats for bureaucrats. We protested within the government, we protested outside the government. We took to streets and protested and it shows that we are all for forestation and maintaining the green cover of the capital. We had adopted a large-scale tree plantation drive in September last year. The drive was part of a campaign to fight air pollution and plant lakhs of trees across Delhi.

The people of Delhi will vote and elect their candidate on Sunday, May 12, 2019.

#ITCounts is an Indiatimes initiative to move beyond the noise and the name-calling and focus on issues that really matter to our generation. We aim to be more about migration, pollution, LGBTQ rights, women's issues and healthcare than about Pakistan, political posturing and trolling.

If you have any suggestions/inputs/feedback or advice please hit us up at kabeer.sharma@timesinternet.in