Now, air quality data only after CPCB authentication

Residents of Delhi will not get real time air pollution data for many areas as it will be disseminated to people only after authentication by the national pollution watchdog, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB). So, it would be ‘deferred’ real time air quality data.

Updated on: Mar 11, 2015, 01:12:33 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Residents of Delhi will not get real time air pollution data for many areas as it will be disseminated to people only after authentication by the national pollution watchdog, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB). So, it would be ‘deferred’ real time air quality data.

The move, experts say, is the government’s attempt to regulate air pollution data and prevent releasing raw data on quality of air, which normally shows high toxicity in air, in Delhi.

The raw data released by the Delhi Pollution Control Committee on the real time basis for six locations on its website had shown high levels of particulate air pollution in the capital this winter creating a lot of consternation among government agencies.

The DPCC data showed that Delhi’s air this winter was more polluted than Chinese capital Beijing, which Gufran Beig’s of the Ministry of Earth Sciences’ System for Air Quality Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR) had questioned recently.

The CPCBs’ own record on releasing data of areas having high pollution had not been very encouraging for people seeking information on real time basis. Its air pollution monitoring website many a times shows the “data under scrutiny” for areas having high particulate matter (PM) pollution. This principle will also apply to DPCC now.

“The data for notified monitored parameters from all monitoring stations will be sent to CPCB for analysis and authenticated air quality information will be communicated to DPCC on daily basis for further dissemination,” said an environment ministry statement on Tuesday.

A decision to this effect was taken at a meeting chaired by Shailesh Nayak, secretary ministry of Earth Sciences on Monday to “maximise” usage of data generated and “harmonise” observations.

“Instead of regulating the air quality data, it would have been better if the CPCB would have been given the mandate to improve capacity of the state pollution control boards in quality monitoring of air across cities. CPCB should ensure that high quality real time air pollution data should be available for public,” said Anumita Roy Chaudhary of Centre for Science and Environment.

Apart from DPCC, air quality in Delhi is monitored by CPCB and the Indian Meteorological Department through SAFAR. The three agencies monitor air quality data at 26 locations in the capital, maximum for any city in the country but does not have a uniform mechanism to disseminate the information on real time basis.

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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