Prevention is better than cure: Bombay High Court on Air Pollution

The Bombay High Court Monday questioned the State government about its poor implementation of the laws and guidelines to tackle air pollution and said that the authorities should try and prevent air pollution rather than going for remedial measures after the situation has gone bad..A division bench of Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice GS Kulkarni said that despite having guidelines in place, the implementation of the same continued to remain poor.“We have the law and rules. What is required is implementation. There has to be a permanent and robust mechanism to ensure implementation. Now we have to change the approach. It cannot be remedial, it has to be preventive. The approach now cannot be that you are thirsty, so you dig a well. Now these are emergent situations,” the Court said. The Court also said that one can find umpteen violations of such guidelines in the city. “We find that experts and policymakers are doing a good job but it’s the implementation that causes pain. It is very common knowledge that if you roam around in Mumbai you can find so many violations. Once you carry your own report and see,” the Court said..CJ Upadhyaya emphasized that the implementation of the guidelines was crucial.“There is a complete strategy chalked out by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) with points to curb air pollution. The Maharashtra State Pollution Control Board (MPCB) is primarily tasked with monitoring air pollution, also keeping in check the industries. So the guidelines are there, enactments are there, still why all this? You do not conduct periodic monitoring,” the judge questioned..The Court’s observations came while hearing public interest litigation (PIL) case initiated suo motu in 2023 after rising air pollution in city of Mumbai.On February 6, the bench had directed the State to present a roadmap containing steps to conduct periodic monitoring of polluting industries..During the hearing on March 18, the Chief Justice urged the State government to consider forming a statutory mechanism to handle pollution related issues which would include a Commission to hear grievances.“We request and impress upon you to have a statutory mechanism instead of involving the court. You need to have a statutory mechanism on how to go about it? Who is going to monitor the polluting industries? Who is going to take action? Who is the authority to take action against officials who are erring in their duties, who will do all this? It is nice to know and hear that air pollution are much lower, but wait for 2-3 more months, the situation will be same unless you take these steps,” the Court said..It directed the MPCB to take steps to initiate process of rigorous air pollution audit starting from the red-category industries in Mumbai Metropolitan Region.Red category industries are those having potential to emit high pollution such as thermal power plants, large industries, refineries, asbestos manufacturing units etc..The Court will hear the case next on June 20.