Potential polluters make up 53% of state pollution control boards: Report

Nearly 53 per cent of the members of State Pollution Control Boards (SPCBs) represent potential polluters, including industries and public sector companies, which points to a serious conflict of interest, according to a Centre for Policy Research (CPR) report that was quoted by TOI.

On these boards, medical experts, academics and scientists only make up 7 per cent of members, according to the CPR think tank.

The CPR report studied the structure and membership of 10 SPCBs: Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Delhi, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and West Bengal. The report said that most boards did not meet the requirement of having at least two experts in the field of air quality management. There is also an insufficient representation of people from the public health sector and civil society.

The cities under scrutiny represent the Gangetic Plains, which experience the most air pollution due to several factors.

The analysis found that 40 per cent of posts were vacant at all the boards under the lens. Over 80 per cent of the technical positions lay vacant in Jharkhand and over 75 per cent were unoccupied in Bihar and Haryana.

The report flagged these issues at the pollution watchdogs and said that this severely impacted the ambitious commitments that the governments had made for air quality improvement through the National Clean Air Programme.

"Given the nature of air pollution, we need impactful inter-sectoral coordination to drive preventive and mitigation actions," the report said.