Concerns Raised Over National Clean Air Program's Effectiveness

Critique of the National Clean Air Program
On Saturday, Congress General Secretary Jairam Ramesh expressed serious concerns regarding the National Clean Air Program, highlighting multiple flaws at various levels. He pointed out that the allocated funds in several cities have not been fully utilized.
Ramesh, a former environment minister, took to social media platform 'X' to state that the program suffers from significant policy shortcomings. He emphasized that a major oversight is the program's focus on measuring and monitoring PM10 (particles smaller than 10 microns) instead of PM2.5 (particles smaller than 2.5 microns), which is responsible for thousands of deaths annually.
He further noted that despite the program's limited scope, the utilization of funds has been disappointingly low. According to Ramesh, the 130 cities benefiting from this initiative have only managed to use between 70% and 78.5% of the allocated funds.
In cities like Delhi, where air pollution has become a public health crisis and a national embarrassment, less than 33% of the funds received under this program have been spent.
Ramesh also highlighted alarming figures from other regions, stating that Faridabad utilized only 26.7%, Noida less than 10%, and even Varanasi, the Prime Minister's constituency, managed to use just 48.85% of its allocated funds, which is significantly below the national average.