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Bengaluru: Delhi has been witnessing very high levels of air pollution for consecutive days now but the parliament did not discuss the issue for the entirety of the Winter Session, from December 1 to 19. 

Meanwhile, the union government has claimed in parliament that there is no proof for any direct link between air pollution and ill health – this time, lung diseases. 

In a written reply on Thursday, December 18, the minister of state of the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Kirti Vardhan Singh said that there is “no conclusive data” to establish a “direct correlation between higher AQI levels and lung diseases”.

No debate in parliament

The Air Quality Index (AQI, a measure of air pollution that takes into account major pollutants in the atmosphere such as fine particulate matter) in Delhi at 4 pm on December 19 was 374, according to the daily bulletin by the Central Pollution Control Board. 

This marks the ninth consecutive day that air quality in the national capital has been in the “Very Poor” or “Severe” category this month. The AQI in the city on December 18 according to the CPCB was 373. This is the worst air quality that Delhi has witnessed in December since 2018, Hindustan Times had reported.

The parliament was supposed to discuss the issue of air pollution in the Lok Sabha on Thursday. However, this did not happen and was pushed to the next day. It was not discussed on this day — the final day of the Parliament’s Winter Session, December 19 — either. 

Parliamentary affairs minister Kiren Rijiju blamed members of the opposition for ‘stalling’ the debate on air pollution, claiming that the Union government had been ready to discuss it.

“…[T]he opposition’s behaviour during the debate in Lok Sabha on Viksit Bharat Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) (VB-G RAM G) Bill was unacceptable. Some of the opposition members even stood atop the desks of the table office and (Lok Sabha) Secretary General. Some Congress members also conveyed that there was no need for a debate on pollution. That is why the issue could not be taken up for discussion,”........

© The Wire