Soon, no fuel without valid pollution-under-check certificate in Delhi: Govt

Having a valid pollution-under-check certificate will soon be made mandatory for refueling vehicles at fuel pumps in the national capital. The city government will put a draft policy in this regard in the public domain for inviting suggestions and objections. Environment Minister Gopal Rai said the policy will help ensure that polluting vehicles do not ply in Delhi and residents enjoy cleaner air. Reena Gupta, advisor to the minister, said the policy affirms the commitment of the Kejriwal government towards ensuring clean air for all citizens of Delhi. “Vehicle owners will have to carry their PUCC to the fuel pump. In case the PUCC is found invalid, they will have to get it reissued at the pump,” a statement said.

“This is a very ambitious policy. North India including Delhi face grave air pollution particularly in winter. With this policy in place, vehicles will be mandated to have their PUC certificate with them at the fuelling station. Thus, pollution levels of vehicles in the state will be kept in check from time to time,” the statement quoted Rai as saying. The government is also working on technology-based measures for effective implementation of the policy to ensure that vehicle owners as well as petrol pump owners do not face any inconvenience and there are no long queues because of checking of PUC certificates. While the exact mechanisms are being worked out, these methods can also include technologies like radio-frequency identification systems.

Earlier this month, the Delhi government had issued a draft Motor Vehicle Aggregators Scheme, 2021, calling on online passenger and commercial vehicle operators to increasingly adopt electric vehicles. In August 2020, the government had introduced Delhi Electric Vehicles policy which aims at increasing the EV share in total vehicle sales to 25 percent by 2024. In October last year, the city government launched a massive drive to check PUC certificates and deployed around 500 teams at petrol pumps for this purpose. Under Section 190(2) of the Motor Vehicle Act, 1993, vehicle owners not having a valid PUC can be fined up to Rs 10,000, or imprisoned for up to six months or both. The owners are required to get their vehicles tested to ascertain if they meet emission standards for pollutants such as carbon monoxide, nitrous oxide and carbon dioxide.

There are 966 authorised pollution checking centres in the city. The city government had earlier announced that it will deregister all diesel vehicles which completed 10 years on January 1, 2022, and issue a no-objection certificate (NOC) so that they can be re-registered in other places. However, no NOC will be issued for diesel vehicles that have completed 15 years or more on the date of applying for it, according to an order issued earlier this month. The government also implements the “Red Light On, Gaadi Off” campaign during winter to cut down vehicular pollution.

Under the campaign launched on October 16, 2020, drivers are encouraged to switch off their vehicles while waiting for the traffic light to turn green. As per government estimates, the transport sector accounts for 28 percent of the PM2.5 emissions in Delhi. Vehicular contribution also makes up 80 percent of nitrogen oxide and carbon monoxide in Delhi’s air. A total of 1.33 crore vehicles are registered in Delhi currently. The count of vehicles in the national capital more than doubled to 643 per thousand population in 2019-20 from 317 in 2005-06.