Delhi air pollution: SC to hear matter regularly, seeks solutions

The Supreme Court will hear the Delhi NCR air pollution case regularly from Monday. CJI Surya Kant, noting the urgency, said the court has no 'magic wand' and will focus on identifying the multiple causes of pollution to find effective solutions.

Supreme Court to Regularly Monitor Delhi Air Pollution

The Supreme Court on Thursday agreed to examine the matter related to the problem of increasing air pollution in Delhi NCR on a regular basis starting Monday. A bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi also agreed with the submissions of amicus (court-appointed lawyer Senior Advocate Aprajita Singh), who sought an urgent hearing in the matter by highlighting the urgency of the situation.

Court Seeks Solutions, Acknowledges Complexity

While acknowledging that the problem of air pollution is "definitely an issue that every resident in Delhi NCR is facing, the Court also remarked that it doesn't have a magic wand to quickly resolve the issue, which is caused not by one but various reasons. The apex court added that each reason or cause for the increase in air pollution in Delhi needs to be identified first. Only then, the Court noted, will we be able to find solutions to deal with each of those causes. "We will take up the matter. We don't have a magic wand which courts can use to find quick solutions on this. The problems we have identified, solutions (to those problems) are what we need. We will have to identify all the reasons. There is no one reason for the problem. People may be thinking there may be only one reason but there are various factors. Only domain experts and scientists can find out solutions to deal with each reason (for causes of increasing air pollution). We hope and expect that the government may have come up with something. We'll take up the matter on a regular basis. List on Monday", the CJI said.

Apex Court to Continue Regular Monitoring

Earlier, the previous Chief Justice of India (CJI) BR Gavai, while hearing the air pollution case, had directed the governments of Delhi, Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan to implement preventive measures to reduce air pollution and to ensure that their reviews are regularly conducted. The Court had also directed that these matters be monitored by the apex court on a regular basis. CJI Kant today held a similar view and stated that the apex court would examine the issue on a regular basis and listed the case for Monday.

According to the CPCB, the national capital recorded an Air Quality Index (AQI) of 349 at 7 am on Thursday. (ANI)

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