India has 39 of the world’s 50 ‘Most Polluted Cities’. Surprisingly, Chennai is not among the 50 most polluted cities. “In 2022, India relaxed environment compliance rules for coal mines, allowing for increased production in response to power outages exacerbated by extreme heatwaves. As a result, in November last year, steam coal imports hit a 10-month low and total coal production increased 11.7 per cent to 75.9 mt,” revealed a report.
In the list, Bhiwadi in Rajasthan is in the third spot, and Delhi ranks fourth. Chennai occupies the 686th spot. Among the big cities listed, Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru and Chennai occupy the last spot. “The National Clean Air Program (NCAP) launched by the Indian government in 2019 was updated in 2022 with a new target of 40 per cent reduction in PM concentration by 2026. In addition, the plan seeks to reduce PM concentrations by 20-30 per cent by 2024 in all identified non-attainment cities (Chennai is a non-attainment city).
