Air Quality Index (AQI) or Apathy Quantified Index (AQI); the choice is ours.

Air Quality Index (AQI)

Or

Apathy Quantified Index (AQI); the choice is ours.

With casual indifference amongst us urbanites, the very high pollution levels of PM 2.5 > 500 (severe) has come to be accepted as the new normal. Instead of the state of the art, real time monitoring system by the Ministry of Earth Sciences serving as a tool for taking enlightened decisions, it has become just another stock market ticker.

So what can you and I do to improve the air quality of our neighbourhood? Well, quite a bit really, and inversely nothing at all;

For starters, lets understand vehicular pollution is a major contributor to pollution, and living 200 to 500 meters from a major road, (Ring Road in our case) Diesel fumes is a major contributor to the Nitrous Oxides the carcinogenic substance that causes lung cancer. Residents living in the vicinity of the Ring Road are most exposed, and hence prone to Lung Cancer, which will begin to manifest itself amongst residents (unfortunately) over the next few years.

On monitoring the AQI (air quality index) at night, a sharp increase is noticed when trucks are permitted to enter and ply through the city, the Ring Road AQI peaks at approx. 3 a.m. with a toxic haze overhang in the adjacent areas.

Hence, quite obviously, vehicular pollution in our vicinity is a great risk, and despite efforts by NGT to ban 15 year old diesel vehicles, or impose an environmental tax on trucks entering the city, implementation remains tardy, and trucks continue to transit through the city. The Eastern and Western Periphery highways are yet to become a reality, so till then we will have to bear the indignity of breathing noxious diesel fumes.

Long journey’s start with the first step, as residents we can take tiny steps, as desperate times call for desperate measures. In the first instance the most attainable goal within the realm of our possibility would be to plant trees & roadside shrubs all along the periphery of the Ring Road. Again before you flick you hand and say ‘Oh that’s passé; be assured this is the single most effective step residents can take, no permissions required, no red tape and sustainable technology  for all to participate, therefore largely doable. Roadside trees and plants are the first line of defence against vehicular fumes and pollution; are carbon sinks, sequestering Carbon, and releasing Oxygen! Imagine, once these plants establish themselves in the soil, they require very little looking after, acting as sentinels, guarding us against noxious gasses, taking upon themselves the burden of pollution, and giving us Oxygen in return! Truly this is the benevolence of nature.

On the larger picture, we the residents of Defence Colony have to petition the Government of Delhi and / or the Courts for a complete ban the passage of trucks on the Ring Road, which is our constitutional right. Article 21 Right to Life guarantees us the right to clean air, right to a clean environment, and if we are being denied these rights by apathy and negligence of the State, the Courts can direct appropriate authorities for necessary implementation.

Two measures discussed above; one to be done by us residents; with our hands, and the other to coerce a recalcitrant administration.

Shall we leave our armchairs and begin?