What Indians worry about most? The air we breathe

CAN'T BREATHE EASY: Delhi has done its fair share to cut air pollution but it still can't breath easy.

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New Delhi: Akanksha loves speed and outdoor sports but pleasures like these is a rarity for the 10-year-old as her companion on most of her outings is an inhaler because she suffers from chronic asthma.

“Coal is produced in my locality so it becomes very difficult for me to breath when I am outdoors. Because of coal dust I develop breathing problems,” Akanksha said.

Most Delhiites agree with Akanksha that the city is choking because of the high pollution level, which incidentally is back to the pre-CNG days. And no prizes for guessing that the biggest contributor to the pollution are automobiles.

Ironically, Delhi is also one of the few Indian cities to have done more than its fair share to cut air pollution in the last six years.

Polluting industries have been relocated, government buses, three-wheelers, and taxis run on CNG, 15-year-old commercial vehicles are off roads and there is a tighter control on power plants, but none of this is able to combat 4.5 million registered vehicles with 1,000 being added every day. Add to this, an ever increasing number of diesel vehicles and the future looks completely dismal.

“The gains that we had made in switching buses to CNG is being nullified because of increase in private diesel vehicles and pollution caused by them,” Vivek Chattopadhyaya from the Centre for Science and Environment explained.

So opt for car pools, cut down on the number of private vehicles and if not then be prepared to carry an oxygen cylinder with you soon.