Delhi ranks 30th on environment index

The Planning Commission’s environment index for 2012 has ranked Delhi quite low on different environmental parameters. The Capital is placed at the 30th position among 35 states and union territories. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: May 30, 2013, 23:57:45 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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The Planning Commission’s environment index for 2012 has ranked Delhi quite low on different environmental parameters. The Capital is placed at the 30th position among 35 states and union territories.

High air pollution, low groundwater level and inadequate facilities to treat hazardous waste has earned Delhi this dubious distinction. As per a latest Central Pollution Control Board report, particulate matter in Chandni Chowk was highest for any location in India.

The plan panel’s report for Delhi’s annual plan (2013-14) says the water drawn from the ground was ‘unsustainable’ at 138%. While south Delhi was extracting an alarming 201% of ground water, east Delhi wasn’t far off at 180%. East and south Delhi are two of the city’s water-scarce districts.

Moreover, the city isn’t even trying to improve the groundwater level. Of the 300 restorable water bodies, only 121 have been restored, the panel said. It has asked the city government to seek the help of the Central Ground Water Authority for better aquifer management.

Another area of concern is Delhi’s inability to find space for treating its increasing hazardous waste. The government’s bid to set up hazardous treatment and disposal facility in Rajasthan has failed as the state government has refused to provide land. Even Haryana is unwilling to provide it land. Setting up a facility within the city is difficult.

Of the 750 million gallons of sewage generated in the city every day, Delhi has capacity to treat only 535 million gallons. Even that capacity is not being fully utilised, the panel has said. The result: A dead Yamuna.

The only positive in the report is that the city has managed to maintain its green cover.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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