Govt seeks to make operational real-time pollution data before winter onset

New Delhi
Delhi’s environment minister Gopal Rai on Tuesday directed the principal secretary (environment and forest) to ensure the real-time source apportionment study is made operational by the Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC) before the onset of winter, to keep a tab on air pollution.
Rai, in a letter to the principal secretary, said IIT Kanpur’s tenure to manage the infrastructure and oversee the study ended last September and plans for the same to be taken over by the government were yet to be completed.
“Since the study period for IIT Kanpur is already over in September 2023 and considering that the DPCC is a regulatory air quality monitoring body, a proposal of the environment department for taking over the existing infrastructure, including equipment and mobile van by the DPCC, was approved on June 26, 2024,” Rai said, adding the last DPCC review meeting mentioned the delay in making the “super-site” functional.
The Delhi cabinet approved the real-time source apportionment project in July 2021, with a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed in October 2021 between DPCC and IIT Kanpur, which executed the project. Real-time data was made available to the Delhi government from November 2022 and to the general public from January 30, 2023.
In the letter, Rai said: “It is directed that the existing infrastructure set up for conducting the study on ‘real time source apportionment’ at Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg be made fully operational by the DPCC, well before the onset of the winter season, so that precise data about sources of pollution can be collected and mitigation measures could be taken accordingly.”
Last October, the minister flagged that the study had been halted by DPCC chairman Ashwani Kumar over an alleged refusal to complete a ₹2 crore payment to the institute. Writing to chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, Rai said that Kumar, the then chairman, was raising objections over the validity of the data gathered and the methodology of the study since February 2023. The study was eventually resumed in November, following Supreme Court orders, but it stopped functioning after winter.
The study can assess and share data on sources of pollution at any given time of the day, allowing government bodies to take specific priority action. A mobile van, part of the study, can also travel across the city and give localised data on sources of pollution.
The principal secretary (environment and forest) did not respond to requests for comment.