48-hr deadline for Centre to give plan to arrest pollution

The court also considered the submission on alleged differences among various authorities and between Centre and the Delhi government and asked them to devise a ‘common minimum programme’ at least for taking steps to deal with the pollution menace. 

“We want to know whether you (Centre) have any disaster management plan. Do you have a policy which deals with graded responses to the situation and provides what action would be taken at which stage? “What is the protocol? Now the time has come where we need to have this,” a bench comprising Chief Justice T S Thakur and Justices A K Sikri and S A Bobde said.

During the 30-minute long hearing, the bench sought to know from Solicitor General Ranjit Kumar, representing the Centre, about the policy to deal with the rising pollution levels and asked whether the Centre monitored the situation. There should be a policy with regard to steps to be taken at every stage such as at level one, particular decisions would be taken and at level two, odd-even scheme would be implemented and at level three, schools would be closed, the bench suggested while giving illustrations on possible graded responses to emerging situations. 

NGT slams stubble burning 

The National Green Tribunal also came down heavily on Delhi and other neighbouring states for not taking steps to control stubble burning and directed them to give complete mechanism on implementation of its directions by Wednesday to curb pollution. 

A bench headed by Justice Swatanter Kumar took to task the secretaries of Delhi, Haryana, Rajasthan, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh for not implementing its orders on crop burning and containing air pollution. 

“What did you do when all this smog was going on? What steps did you take, except till Monday? For the first five days nobody did anything, be it the states or the Centre. Show us one thing visible to common man,” the bench said.