New Delhi: As Delhi is wrapped in a thick layer of smog with air quality in the ‘severe’ category, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Manoj Tiwari on Thursday lambasted the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government saying that the negligence of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal is fatal for the people of the national capital.
Speaking to ANI, Tiwari said, “All people in Delhi should protect themselves. Everyone should use masks. The sad thing is Kejriwal ji is not even making any effort. He installed a smog tower just to show the media and today that too is closed.” The BJP leader said that Kejriwal claims that each smog tower costs Rs 2 crore and if 400 such towers were installed, Rs 800 crore would have been spent on giving fresh air to Delhiites.
Tiwari said, “What is the condition of the children today? What is the condition of the laborers who are leaving for work in the morning? The biggest contribution in this entire pollution is of the burning of stubble in Punjab. Earlier AAP used to target Punjab for the pollution in Delhi. But now that they have a government in Punjab, they cannot use that as an excise. When they are in government in Punjab, they could have bought stubble from the farmers. Farmers would have benefitted from this. I think it is the misfortune of Delhi by having Arvind Kejriwal as its chief minister.”
The BJP MP said the Supreme Court and NGT should take strict action on the matter. “The way Delhi government is negligent, it is fatal for the people of Delhi,” he aid.
Tiwari said the Haryana government has been buying stubble from farmers. “Is the Punjab government buying stubble from farmers?” he said.
The former BJP chief said the AAP government intends to reduce pollution only through big advertisements.
“I want to appeal to the people of Delhi to save their life by own since Arvind Kejriwal has left Delhi to its fate. A careless Chief Minister enjoying himself leaving Delhi at great risk,” he added.
Meanwhile, Union Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change Bhupendra Yadav on Thursday expressed deep concern over the increasing Air Quality Index of the National Capital and said that due to the stubble burning in Punjab, the air quality of NCR has reached to ‘severe’ category.
Speaking to media persons, Bhupendra Yadav said, “I have chaired more than 14 consecutive review meetings, after May, this year regarding Delhi’s Air pollution. In terms of AQI, there is a lot of difference. The situation prevailing for the last two-three days is very worrying. We have worked a lot for the management of stubble burning.”
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“Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana have done more satisfactory work in the area of improving air quality as compared with the last year. However the situation of stubble burning is worst in Punjab as compared to the last year,” he added.
Delhi recorded the ‘severe’ category in the Air Quality Index (AQI) meter on Thursday.
Approaching the winter season Delhi breached the ‘severe’ category as the AQI stood at 408 at 7 am on Thursday morning. Delhiites woke up to a thick envelope of smog as air quality in the national capital and in adjoining regions, dipped into severe category again. Unfavourable meteorological conditions with slower wind speed and a sudden spike in stubble-burning incidents are attributed to the dip in air quality.
Prima facie the cause behind the bad air in Delhi is farm fires in the neighbouring states and vehicular emissions. Both factors are deemed major contributors to air pollution in Delhi.
As Delhi is forced to breathe the toxic air, several residents have reported breathing difficulties, with the elderly and schoolchildren being the worst hit.
The National Capital Region (NCR) also witnessed bad air as Noida, which is part of the national capital region, slipped to an AQI of 393, in the ‘very poor’ category, while Gurugram’s AQI stood at 318 and continued to remain in the ‘very poor category, as per data released by SAFAR (System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting And Research) India.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by HW News staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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