The Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) has restricted outdoor construction and demolition work that raises dust across the National Capital Region (NCR) from November 5 to 20, a window that spans Diwali and what is typically the season’s worst stubble burning impact, extending the curbs to highways, roads and other linear public projects.
“From June itself, we are seeing restrictions being announced in advance, including this one. “Clean air cannot be secured by any one agency or any one State acting alone. The window covers Diwali, on November 8, and the first two weeks of November, when stubble burning and its impact on Delhi have historically peaked. Delhi’s permanent winter anti-pollution framework, notified in July, comes into force on November 1.
The I3C brings every data stream that matters onto a single screen, so that a farm fire, a polluting stack or an uncovered construction site is seen, flagged and acted upon in real time.
“The decision has been taken as a preventive step by CAQM, as it looked at past data and found conditions are typically adverse during this window,” Yadav told the media. Sunil Dahiya, founder and lead analyst at Envirocatalysts, said that despite the many exemptions, the curbs were a good start for the Centre and states in acting pre-emptively. Though a good start, we can target even more sectors,” Dahiya said. This is a paradigm shift from reacting to pollution to anticipating it, and every implementing agency must now act in real-time on these alerts without delay,” Yadav said.
Earlier, we would see Grap restrictions coming when the pollution is already at its peak. Union environment minister Bhupender Yadav announced the curbs on Friday as part of the Centre’s efforts to control air pollution in the region. CAQM notified them late on Friday in an order that applies across the NCR, including Delhi, and directs the NCR state governments and the Delhi government to enforce it.
It consolidates seasonal restrictions into a single set of rules that apply every year from November 1 to February 28, including restrictions on the entry of non-Delhi vehicles below BS-VI standards, mandatory valid pollution-under-control (PUC) certificates for fuel purchases, 50% work-from-home for office staff and curbs on dust-generating construction activities. The platform draws data from 111 continuous ambient air quality monitoring stations across Delhi-NCR, over 2,300 industries and more than 3,200 active construction sites. Parking charges at authorised sites will also double during the winter period. PAVAN-I3C, which operates on the principle of ‘Detect, Analyse, Act’, brings together information on air quality, emissions, weather, satellite imagery, traffic, public complaints and compliance. Deviations from prescribed norms and statutory directions will trigger alerts and escalation to the concerned agencies.
