No fuel for Delhi vehicles without valid pollution certificates

New Delhi: Delhi government informed on Saturday that vehicles without valid pollution control certificates would not be served fuel in the union territory from October 25. Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai said that the decision was taken at a meeting of officials from the environment, transport and traffic departments, convened on September 29, PTI reported.

The meeting discussed the modalities and implementation of the plan, the minister said in a press conference.

Rai said, "Vehicular emission is one of the key contributors to rising pollution in Delhi. It is imperative to reduce it, so it has been decided that from October 25 petrol, diesel will not be provided at petrol pumps without a PUC certificate of the vehicle."

He added that a notification would be released soon detailing the new decision, and the modalities would become clear in a week.

The Delhi Transport Department has reported that more than 17 lakh vehicles, including 13 lakh two-wheelers and three lakh cars, were being driven without valid PUC certificates till July 2022. Under the Motor Vehicles Act, vehicle owners without a valid PUC certificate will be jailed for up to six months or fined up to Rs 10,000 or both.

Minister Rai further said on Saturday that all government departments have also been advised to get PUC certificates of their vehicles checked.

"On March 3, 2022, we issued a public notice inviting suggestions on the implementation of the move 'No PUC, No fuel'. On May 2, suggestions were received, and many people were in favour of the implementation of this move. So, the government is preparing to implement it from October 25," the minister said at the conference.

The minister then talked about the Delhi government's plan to launch its 24x7 war room on October 3 to combat pollution and ensure effective and serious implementation of the amended Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP). GRAP is a set of anti-air pollution guidelines followed in Delhi, and its vicinity as the poor air quality situation is severe.

The revised GRAP mandates that curbs can be imposed on polluting activities for up to three days in advance on the basis of forecasts. Earlier, measures to battle air pollution were implemented only after the concentration of PM2.5 and PM10 reached specific thresholds. But new GRAP will impose restrictions on Air Quality Index (AQI) instead of PM2.5 and PM10 concentrations.

According to the minister, the government here will also launch an anti-dust campaign from October 6. There will be surprise inspections at construction sites to check dust pollution. Construction sites bigger than 5,000 sqm will have to deploy one anti-smog gun, those bigger than 10,000 sqm should have two such guns and sites bigger than 20,000 sqm will have to engage four anti-smog guns to combat dust pollution, the minister said.

"If these measures are not followed by companies at construction sites, then strict action will be taken against them under the anti-dust campaign," minister Rai added.