Worsening environmental pollution in the national Capital may be getting loads of lip-sympathy from celebrities and the political class but in real terms not many seem to be really geared to mitigate the poison around as was evident from the 'scary' absence of most of the MPs and officials from a meeting of a Parliamentary panel on the issue on Friday. The issue gained political connotations as the non-presence of the Delhi MP and former cricketer Gautam Gambhir was circulated by the AAP in the social media by showing him as 'enjoying JalabisRs with his commentary teammates covering the India-Bangladesh cricket test match in Indore.
Gambhir was the only MP from Delhi who had been summoned to the meeting of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Urban Development scheduled to start 11 am. Attendance was poor, with only four of 29 MPs on the panel list turning up, according to sources.
Members present at the meeting were upset with those like the three municipal commissioners, DDA vice chairman and Secretary/joint secretary of the Environment Ministry absent and plan to raise the issue with the Speaker. They asked junior officials to convey to their seniors that they should have attended the meeting, sources said.
"Instead of sitting in commentary box and enjoying...We challenge @GautamGambhir to stop playing blame games over pollution and ATTEND MEETINGS ON AIR POLLUTION which he skipped ", tweeted @AamAadmiParty.
In his explanation, the former cricketer-turned-BJP MP said his work "will speak for itself" and then criticised the AAP for "making my commercial engagements (which were entered into before I had become an MP) an issue..."
In an extraordinary " care a damn" response , top officials of the Environment Ministry, DDA and municipal commissioners too stayed away from a key meeting of the parliamentary body that too on the eve of the Winter session of the Parliament which is expected to deliberate on the deadly poison spreading across the city.
The Environment Ministry clarified that " some of its officials were present during the deliberations" while one was busy in critical Supreme Court hearing.
The questions that the members were planning to raise included: As there are about 50 lakh cars on the roads in Delhi, is the Government coming up with any sort of car pool policy or regulation?
Another question was that as per the Union Government, Rs 1,150 crores were given by the Centre to the states in the last one year to combat air pollution along with 14,000 machines. Does the Government have a quantitative and qualitative utilisation report of the money disbursed?
The third question to be raised pertained to the Supreme Court's recent observation that everybody ranging from the secretary to the Rs gram pradhanRs will be held responsible for losses due to air pollution.