Chennai air quality gets bad to worse
Chennai got the dubious distinction of worst polluted city in the country after registering the highest number of ‘severe' days in the first six months of the year.
Chennai: Concerned over the deteriorating air quality in Tamil Nadu, especially in Chennai, the state transport department is in the process of digitising Pollution Under Control (PUC) certificates or emission certificates.
Earlier this month, Chennai got the dubious distinction of worst polluted city in the country after registering the highest number of ‘severe’ days in the first six months of the year.
The Air Quality Index (AQI) value was between 401-500 in 17.7 per cent of all days between this period, considered severe or hazardous. The city had even surpassed Delhi, which was considered one of the highly polluted metros in the world.
Transport department sources said it was time state government took some urgent measures to check the rising pollution levels. The digitisation of emission certificates will go a long way in containing pollution levels and also help in monitoring and policy making.
Explaining how it worked, a senior official said all 267 authorised Emission Testing Centres (ETC) in 12 zones of the state will be networked online connected to a central server.
Every emission certificate issued will be automatically uploaded to the main server along with necessary information of the vehicle and the owner. On an average, the ETCs will issue a minimum of one lakh certificates each month.
“Each ETC will be given an user ID and password by the jurisdictional RTO and with this the department can curb malpractices in issuing emission certificate and also track vehicles which don’t have the certificate. It’s not an easy task, but a step in the right direction. The main aim is to ensure that all vehicles are following emission norms”, the official said and added that the National Informatics Centre (NIC) had been entrusted with the responsibility of developing the software.
Though the plan was in the pipeline for several years, it failed to get the necessary impetus. “Only now, it is taking shape and will be launched very soon. Already, 50 per cent of the work is completed”, the official added.
( Source : deccan chronicle )
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