Sreelatha Menon: The importance of being earnest

Delhi's green agenda is soft on taxing private vehicles while the govt did not think twice before doubling bus fares last week

Last week saw something that must have made the hearts of many Delhiites stop. It was Union Environment and Forest Minister Jairam Ramesh snubbing the Delhi government’s claims of being green. The minister, who was to unveil the Capital’s climate change agenda, chose to call a spade a spade.

If the state government had any green pretensions, he tore them apart. While those who were unhappy with the state of affairs in the city felt gleeful for a moment, there were others who asked whether the Centre had done its part of the job.

The minister chose to take the beautifully-packaged agenda with a pinch of salt. He said the state was good at preparing slick reports but there was little to show when it came to results. Ramesh was also not too impressed with plans for the Yamuna, the Rs 14,000-crore Japanese aid for cleaning it and the tonnes of sewage that flowed untreated into the hapless river.

The minister cocked a snook at the state’s claims of setting a precedent in transportation through the introduction of CNG buses, pointing out that the use of CNG as a fuel was solely at the initiative of the Supreme Court and people like M C Mehta, whose petition in the Supreme Court led to the decision on CNG. He was underlining the need for governments to do something rather than make tall promises.

The climate change agenda of the Delhi government is a case in point. It came just a week after the state almost doubled bus fares without trying to explore other ways to fund public transport.

The decision involved the CNG buses that were supposed to lure people from private vehicles.

The climate change agenda made a soft mention of the state government’s intention to increase road tax and registration fee for diesel and petrol cars to create a fund to promote public transport. It talked of a congestion tax on cars that would take another three years to affect enough people.

Chandra Bhooshan of the Centre for Science and Environment said: “Where is the urgency in this?” He agreed with Ramesh’s caustic comments but also asked what stops the Central Pollution Control Board from suing the Delhi Jal Board for letting untreated water flow into the Yamuna.

The climate agenda went on to mention how an air ambience fund was promoting battery-operated vehicles and how three-wheelers would switch to batteries. But switching to batteries would mean using carbon through coal-powered electricity.

The agenda was almost silent on the Yamuna but emphasised on getting drinking water from the Renuka dam, something that had been opposed by the local communities around the dam on environmental grounds. What is bad for some cannot be good for anyone inhabiting the same land.

Delhi’s solar-power intentions also found a new packaging in the climate change agenda, which promised to retrofit buildings for energy efficiency but made no mention of mandatory energy efficiency standards.

“The government did not have to use climate change as an excuse to do the things that are promised in the report as these are matters any government will do in the normal course,” said Bhooshan.