Activist urges state to curb night pollution from trucks
Times of India | 11 September 2024
Kolkata: In a letter to chief secretary, green activist Subhas Datta urged the state to take immediate steps to combat night-time air pollution by deploying additional remote sensing devices (RSDs) at places like Vidyasagar Setu, Nivedita Setu, Dankuni toll plaza and Dhulagarh toll plaza to curb pollution caused by goods vehicles that enter Kolkata at night and leave behind a trail of harmful emission.
Datta pointed out controlling such pollution would be crucial in improving Kolkata’s ranking among India’s top cities combating air pollution. In a list released on Sunday, several cities in Bengal, including Kolkata, Howrah, and Asansol, were ranked in the second-rung cities, raising concerns.
Datta’s letter referenced multiple court rulings, including a 2010 directive from the Calcutta High Court, which ordered the deployment of four RSDs in Kolkata, Howrah, North and South 24 Parganas. Despite the directive, as of March 2024, only one RSD was operational. Two more devices were added in April 2024, but Datta insists that this is inadequate given the scale of pollution caused by heavy vehicles.