Why cities are wasting crores on the wrong pollutants

The National Green Tribunal (NGT)’s latest judgment on the National Clean Air Programme (NCAP) in Dharmesh Shah v Union of India & Ors, requires the States/UT to prepare sector-wise implementation roadmaps within six months and links public funding to measurable improvements in air quality. The judgment might not spark the same firestorm like the Aravalli judgment or the battle to save Nicobar. Yet, buried within its 23 pages is a pivotal judicial intervention, a blunt recognition that India’s clean air crisis is no longer just an environmental struggle, it is a failure of public finance.

Delivered by the Southern Bench in Chennai on April 28, the judgment scrutinised the NCAP implementation across Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, and Puducherry. The findings are unsettling. While these States have dutifully checked all the boxes, from forming committees to launching portals, air pollution continues to exceed safe limits across major southern hubs.

The tribunal’s sharpest critique targets how public money is being handled. Take Karnataka as the case in point: the State received over Rs 618 crore in the NCAP and Finance Commission grants up to the FY2025-2026. However, by late 2024, only 37% of those funds were utilised. Even more revealing is where the money went. The NGT noted that over 86% of the expenditure was concentrated almost exclusively on road dust management.

Road washing, mechanical sweepers, and paving are the 'low-hanging fruit' of urban governance. They are easy to sanction and provide visible, politically marketable images of "action". But Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Chennai, the most lethal pollutants don't just come from dust. They are the products of diesel combustion, industrial fuel, and waste burning.

For years, the NCAP has functioned as a scheme obsessed with ‘disbursal’ rather than ‘outcomes’. Cities compete for funds and report expenditure, but the fundamental questions are rarely asked: Did PM 2.5 levels actually drop? Did respiratory illnesses decline? Did emissions from industrial clusters or diesel fleets fall?

The NGT has now directed that future spending must be linked to "sector-specific emission reductions" and "measurable air quality outcomes". This is a massive shift. It moves the needle from ‘symbolic environmentalism’ toward hard institutional accountability.

A recurring theme in the judgment is the ‘data vacuum’. Without comprehensive emission inventories or year-on-year reduction targets, policy is reduced to guesswork. While some cities like Surat (industrial monitoring) or Indore (waste management) offer glimpses of success, most urban centres are flying blind.

Furthermore, the tribunal highlighted that pollution does not respect municipal boundaries. We cannot solve Bengaluru’s air crisis through the GBA alone. Emissions travel across highways and industrial corridors, necessitating ‘airshed governance’ or regional coordination that the NGT is now demanding of the southern States.

The National Capital Region’s Graded Response Action Plan, despite its shortcomings, showed that co-ordinated multi-State action can at least create emergency response systems across jurisdictions. Southern India now requires a similar permanent regional mechanism for industrial corridors, freight transport emissions, and seasonal pollution episodes. Without such coordination, individual city action plans will continue to function like isolated islands fighting a shared atmospheric crisis.

The tribunal’s recommendations, if implemented sequentially, could create the first genuinely accountable clean air governance architecture in India. The insistence on sector-wise implementation roadmaps with timelines and measurable reduction targets is crucial because it forces States to move beyond generic declarations. Maharashtra’s star-rating programme for industrial pollution and Gujarat’s emissions trading pilot for particulate pollution in Surat already demonstrate that compliance improves when industries face measurable benchmarks and financial consequences. Similarly, linking future funding to outcomes rather than expenditure alone could mirror successful public finance reforms in sectors such as sanitation, where performance-linked grants under Swachh Bharat created competition among cities.

Globally, the most successful clean air programmes share three common features. First, they treat air pollution as a public health emergency, not merely an environmental issue. London’s Ultra Low Emission Zone was justified through health data. China’s clean air interventions after the ‘airpocalypse’ years were backed by strict industrial controls and measurable mortality reduction targets. Second, they establish independent monitoring and accountability systems. Data is public, transparent, and difficult to manipulate. Third, they integrate finance with outcomes. Cities do not simply receive money because proposals exist; they receive continued funding because pollution levels demonstrably decline.

The real challenge is whether our governance is capable of converting public finance into breathable air. This judgment is a test of whether the State can finally govern scientifically and protect public health with the seriousness it deserves.

Shailendra Yashwant is a senior adviser to Climate Action Network South Asia (CANSA). X: @shaibaba.

(Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.)