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Coughing Kejriwal: Scary mandate and scary pollution
By
Rajendra Shende
The day Arvind Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party (AAP, which means Common
Man's Party) won unprecedented mandate in Delhi's assembly election, the
City Council in Paris, the French capital, was huddled together to
approve tighter measures to fight air pollution.
Considering the
impacts on health and revenue from tourism, pollution free Paris is
priority for the public as well as to the City Council of Paris. It
announced the measures faster and firmer, given that air pollution is as
big a threat as terrorism recently witnessed during the Charlie Hebdo
event. Generally a clean city, at times Paris air can be bad, depending
on weather conditions.
Monitoring and public display of the air
quality index triggers alarms all over the city even for short duration
of high level of air pollution. Last year, the City Council was forced
to take measures like making public transport free and bringing down the
use of cars. The pollution levels immediately came down.
The day
AAP was sweeping the election, pollution was sweeping Delhi's
atmosphere. The Air Quality Index (AQI) on that day was three times the
standard level.
In winter, during the general election, these
levels were 20 times higher. When I saw images of Arvind Kejriwal on TV,
coughing incessantly while reacting to the electoral success of his
party, I wondered if those PM 2.5 - extremely small size particles of
2.5 micron - are rushing deep into his lungs and getting absorbed in his
body.
Many of the millions of people in Delhi who voted for him
were also running the risk of ailments such as asthma, cardiovascular
diseases, cancer, birth defects and, quite often, early death.
Kejriwal,
publicly described his absolute majority as "scary" due to the
responsibility of carrying a heavy mandate given to him. He has to be
even scarier about the air pollution in New Delhi. Fever of the
celebration may have overshadowed his own bodily fever, but he has to
understand the problem in its depth before starting to solve it.
As
every IIT-alumnus like him knows very well, clear understanding of the
problem itself is half of its solution and remaining is just applying
the fundamentals. On the day, he was sworn in as Delhi's chief minister
he even took the crocin (paracetamol) tablet to bring down the fever.
Would he understand that the problem of his frequent cough and fever is
not just his hectic schedule but also Delhi's polluted air, caused by
the traffic as well as indiscriminate use of diesel, firewood and open
burning?
Air pollution, today, is considered the single largest
environment-related health risk, as per reports of the United Nations
Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Health Organization (WHO). At
the moment, over 1.2 billion people - most in rural areas - don't have
access to electricity and another equally large number of people in
urban areas whose access to electricity is extremely limited - even just
a few hours a day.
As a result, 2.8 billion people rely on wood
or other biomass to cook at their homes, which causes air pollution. In
2012, approximately seven million people died prematurely from illnesses
attributable to household-indoor-and-outdoor air pollution caused by
the inefficient use of solid fuels - sometimes because they have no
access to other fuels and have to rely on biofuels and biological matter
to cook. This was more than double the combined total of HIV/AIDS and
diarrhea-related premature deaths, as per UNEP.
A recent WHO
report, widely highlighted by media, gives New Delhi a status of the
worst polluted city in the world. India's meteorological experts,
sighting the misinterpretation of the measurements, vehemently deny the
report.
Recently I came across the article in social media that
calculated how many hours of life President Obama must have lost due to
breathing Delhi's polluted air by sitting and watching for three hours
the Republic Day parade on January 26. Without getting into the
technicalities of the arguments and counter rejoinders by Indian
weathermen, it is beyond doubt that reducing air pollution could save
thousands of lives in New Delhi and ailing of thousands of thousands of
people due to respiratory diseases.
City Council of Paris has
announced almost revolutionary measures with time lines to counter air
pollution, including direct cash subsidies to users of CNG vehicles, use
of electric/ hybrid cars, to cyclists, monetary concessions for users
of public transports, free parking for cars using CNG, ban on use of
diesel, etc.
Unlike in Paris, some of the root causes of Delhi's
pollution also lie in its nearby states, like Haryana, Punjab and Uttar
Pradesh. Major sources of pollution are the black carbon particles,
matters of size less than 2.5 microns (PM 2.5), resulting from open
burning of leftovers of paddy field in these neighbouring states after
harvesting and the use of diesel in the transport and generators.
When
Kejriwal was making popular promises of corruption-free Delhi, free
electricity and free water, Delhites were breathing dangerous air
unaware of the need that along with audits of the electricity
distribution companies, there is need to audit the use of generators and
indiscriminate use of electricity, mainly due to inefficient air
conditioners that increase the peak electricity loads to tripping
levels.
Along with making Delhi corruption-free, he should also
make time-bound plans for a pollution-free Delhi. His discussions with
neighboring states should be focussed, apart from water supply, on the
prevention of open burning of post-harvest paddy fields, use of firewood
in inefficient 'chulhas' (cooking stoves) and open brick-kilns.
Long-term
futuristic plans described in AAP's mandate are good. But immediate
short-term measures that can bring down pollution level would help
Kejriwal to get healthier people to vote for him next time. Would he now
declare a pollution helpline when air pollution in the capital reaches
suffocating level? And would he first announce the PM levels every time
he holds the Janata Darbar?
(21.02.2015 - Rajendra Shende is chairman of the TERRE Policy Centre and former Director of the UNEP. The views expre