In a one of its kind, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), in its Budget Estimates for FY 2023-24, paved a way for mumbai Air Pollution Mitigation Action Plan amid rising concerns over poor air quality across the city.
Welcoming this decision, members of Mumbai Clean Air Action Hub responded stating to strengthen support by working closely with the BMC.
Mumbai Clean Air Action Hub includes citizen groups, civil society organizations, urban planners, corporates, researchers, experts, and environmentalists working closely with urban local bodies of the city on understanding key interventions to ensure implementation of the city action plan.
Hema Ramani, Campaign-Director, Bombay Environmental Action Group (BEAG) shared: “It's encouraging to hear that BMC has agreed on setting up a Clean Air Coordination Committee, one of the suggestions put forth by members of civil society in a meeting recently. This committee should be set up immediately consisting of a mix of experts as well as citizen groups campaigning for Clean Air. The recommendations of the Committee should be implemented by the civic body as this group will play a crucial role in suggesting mitigation measures to ensure that Mumbai can achieve clean air and the health of people isn't compromised.”
Talking about air purifier towers at the congested areas in the city, Dr Harshal Salve, Additional Professor, All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) expressed: “Smog towers or air purification units have significant limitations. The primary one being that they are expensive and fail to have any real impact on air pollution exposure to the citizens. I don’t think smog towers will be useful in addressing the air pollution problem at its core. What we really need to address is the source of emission rather than trying to capture emissions in the air. This is applicable with smog towers or even air purifiers. We really have to see its cost effectiveness in terms of how much we are investing and how much we are gaining out of it. This intervention is ranked at the lower level against others. Also, there is a need to focus on scaling up the local air quality monitoring in Mumbai so that local solutions can be formulated.”
On the other hand, Bhagwan Kesbhat, Founder, Waatavaran Foundation said: “BMC has taken a very important step in not only recognising that Mumbai's deteriorating air quality has become a growing concern but through its budget it has also announced key mitigation measures to address it. However, it will also be equally important to not waste public funds on failed solutions like smog towers. Last couple of months have shown how the deteriorating air quality had left Mumbaikars gasping for breath and several people even reported suffering from respiratory illnesses. The move to set up robust as well as hyperlocal monitoring mechanisms, can prove to be a step in the right direction to tackle air pollution. Especially, ward level assessment of emissions as well as monitoring air quality around thermal power stations and refineries has never been done before in Maharashtra.”
However, last year, Awaaz Foundation in February 2022 had written to BMC Commissioner seeking health advisories on bad air quality days. Speaking about the same, Sumaira Abdulali, Convener, Awaaz Foundation exclaimed: A year later in February 2023, the BMC budget accepted the need for such an Advisory amidst ever-worsening air quality, while allocating INR 25 crores towards control of air pollution for the first time. It is crucial that the Advisory is implemented in tandem with other measures to reduce air pollution at source.
The BMC has laid down measures for reduction of road dust. They have acknowledged that road dust has more than doubled over the past decade and that road construction materials form a large part. However, not only road construction but other constructions in Mumbai are contributing hugely to air pollution including public and private infrastructure and housing. It will be very important that the guidelines for ensuring dust mitigation from construction sites will be enforced in a stringent manner.”
Debi Goenka, Executive Trustee, Conservation Action Trust mentioned: “The Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) for Mumbai is not being implemented by the BMC despite air pollution levels being worse than Delhi’s. Special precautions were taken only for the sake of the G20 delegates – it seems that for the BMC and the MPCB, the 12 million Mumbaikars are less important than 100 foreigners. The BMC Administrator, as directed by the CM and DCM, has announced that the BMC will set up smog towers even though they have not worked anywhere. This is a complete waste of money that could have been better utilized for setting up a real time air monitoring network with real time alerts.”
Also Read: BMC Budget 2023-24: In a first, capital expenditure has crossed 50% - Key Highlights Here
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