Air critical, it says and wants 15yr-old petrol & 10yr-old diesel vehicles impounded if seen on roads
The Supreme Court on Monday prohibited the plying of 15-year-old petrol vehicles and 10-year-old diesel vehicles in the National Capital Region, describing the air pollution in Delhi as ?horrible? and ?very critical?.
The court directed the transport department to announce that such vehicles would be impounded if driven in Delhi-NCR.
The top court?s directive, in line with an earlier National Green Tribunal order, extends to private vehicles a ban that till now applied only to commercial vehicles, analysts tracking air pollution said.
The court directed the Central Pollution Control Board and the transport department to publish a list of all 15-year-old petrol and 10-year-old diesel vehicles. The bench of Justices Madan B. Lokur, S. Abdul Nazeer and Deepak Gupta said that an advertisement on this should be published in newspapers.
?This ruling upholds the NGT?s earlier order. It is part of a process of phasing out old polluting vehicles while bringing in stringent new emissions standards for new vehicles,? said Anumita Roychowdhury, executive director for research at the non-government Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), New Delhi.
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