Whatsapp forward
Some days, only black humor works, even if it is couched in the flavours of single malt whiskey - Laphroiag being a smoky, ‘peaty’ label from the island of Islay, which describes itself as "the most richly flavoured of all Scotch whiskies".
This rich flavour has been likened to “an old submarine engine”, and references to gargle water are not uncommon. Don’t get me wrong - I actually like Laphroiag, but I don’t like streaming eyes and a pounding head, and that was after conducting a workshop on Friday in an air-conditioned space. I had carried a change of clothes to go ride a bike in a gym after, but when I got into my car, every inflamed cell drove me home, to a wash, and a room buzzing with an air purifier.
And, yes, I am acutely aware of the privilege of being able to work indoors, and that in a space scrubbed by Hepa filters. I am also acutely aware of the droves of those without these privileges streaming into our hospitals, and of the long term impact of noxious air on the lung capacity of the young.
Delhi smog has been an issue for at least a quarter of a century now. At the beginning of this millennium, in 2002, our entire bus fleet was converted to natural gas (CNG), and now all public transport, whether taxis or 3-wheelers are CNG- fuelled. We had a few years of reprieve, but by the end of the first decade, the Delhi air in late October turned even more foul. This time, the finger was pointed at the burning of crop residue, primarily in Haryana and Punjab.
Enough has been written about the flaws of agricultural policy that led to this pass, and though the elaborate charade of finger-pointing between the governments of Delhi, Punjab, Haryana and the Union continues, there is some slow improvement in the percentage of rice paddy that is not burned on the ground. But according to data from the Institute of Tropical Meteorology, on average, not more than 25% of Delhi’s haze - ‘haze’ sounds positively benign, I thought - owes itself to farm fires.
What about the other 75%? I’m sure the powers that be are working on it, but they’ve had over twenty years, and so far the trend is only downwards. Other countries have faced noxious air, and two cities that come to mind are London, and Los Angeles. The smog in L.A. was one of the main triggers for the Clean Air Act in the US, and by 2010, the City Council of Los Angeles estimated that “the Clean Air Act’s implementation has produced economic benefits valued at $2 trillion, over 30 times the cost of the regulation”.
Gas masks in L.A. - before the Clean Air Act*
Colour me sceptical, but we’re just not seeing that kind of concerted, nation-wide, system-level will to tackle India’s pollution problem. I say India, because bad air is not just a Delhi problem. While media attention has focused on the national capital, the broad swathe of winter smog arcs all the way from Punjab to Bihar, tracing the Himalayas, whose ramparts help to lock the pollutants into the air of the Gangetic plain. Over the last couple of years, despite the sea breezes that help clear its air, unregulated economic activity in the Mumbai region has caused a spike in bad air days for our commercial capital.
I just read that Delhi schools have been shut for the next week, in response to our air quality. Most kids will not breathe cleaner air as a result of staying home, while their learning outcomes - already among the lowest in the world - will drop further. This is not to point fingers at the Delhi government, since poor education is a national feature, but to underline the fact that ineffective governance in one area balloons into poor results in others.
Sagging unemployment is a nation-wide crisis, and in times of bad air, construction activity is banned, putting at risk work and incomes for an estimated 70 million people**. Our health indicators, again, are far from exemplary, and the load that toxic air puts on the human system is still being estimated.
I think there’s a broader issue here. Despite our GDP growth having slowed from 8% to 6% (or lower in my estimation), India is choking. Not just on foul air, pathetic schooling, and shabby public health, but also on crowded roads, traffic deaths, ravaged tourist destinations, fouled rivers, garbage mountains, and back-logged courts. All the Production Linked Incentives (PLIs), tax cuts for business, and conclaves dedicated to India Shining Mark II, will achieve nothing if we can’t clean up our act on all of these fronts.
The complex systemic interplays that govern health, education, environment, and the legal system do not respect the silos in which our government works - drawn and quartered into the verticals of functional departments, and the horizontals of states, polluted by acute political rivalry, and a steady worsening of federal cooperation.
The north Indian skies are only the most visible manifestation of that fouled dynamic.
While this is true, Ritik, it is really, really tough to relocate - especially in India, where job opportunities are restricted.
I'm guessing you don't live in Delhi, Kamalini. That's fortunate, because the state of our air is completely unconscionable.