BOMBAY, DECEMBER 16: It was a battle well won by the non-government sector and concerned citizens in the city, when the Bombay High Court today accepted almost all their submissions and passed wide-ranging directions in checking vehicular emissions within greater Mumbai limits. Also, perhaps for the first time, volunteers from these organisations have been directed to actively help the authorities check emission levels in the city.Accordingly, now, a driver of a vehicle found poisoning the city with over-the-limit emission will be immediately fined Rs 1,000 and will not be allowed to ply his vehicle till it is rectified (see box). The second time he does it, registration of the vehicle will be suspended for 15 days and it will be allowed to ply only after further testing and compliance. A third time will attract immediate cancellation of registration and further impertinence will lead to impounding the vehicle and initiation of prosecution against the owner.The court has also directed the Transport Commissioner (TC) to ``continue the drive against polluting vehicles'' and held that the notices presently issued will be ``enforced'' and fresh notices issued. However, acceding to the Bombay Taximens Union's submissions that the TC was implementing emissions levels lower to those stated in the Motor Vehicles Act, the officers will have to play by the book, i.e., smoke emissions should be lower than 65 hartridge smoke units.The court has also ruled that volunteers from the BEAG, the SARF, the Indian Merchants Chamber, the WIAA, will be appointed by the transport commissioners to check on PUC centres in the city and also be included in the flying squads - ``at least 12 to be set up '' - for checking on emission limits of vehicles.The division bench of Chief Justice Y K Sabharwal and Justice Ranjana Desai while passing these directions, referred to the M C Mehta case in Supreme Court which led to similar guidelines for Delhi and noted that Article 21 of the Constitution, that guaranteed right to life, included in its scope the right to breathe clean, unpolluted air by a citizen.However, to tackle many other related issues like fuel quality, use of alternative fuel like CNG, the need for amending the Motor Vehicles Act to reduce standards of smoke emission mentioned therein, the applicability of EURO I and EURO II norms for non-private vehicles, etc will now be considered by a committee headed by the present transport commissioner, V M Lal and include NGOs like the BEAG and CLEAN AIR president, Zenia Khajotia.This committee will also include a representative of the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB), Dr P S Pasricha, former joint commissioner of police, and a representative of the Ministry of Environment and Forests. The state and the Union government have been directed to give names of these representatives to Lal within a week and the committee has been given 12 weeks from today to submit a report for further action.The HC was adjudicating on a public interest petition filed by the Smoke Affected Residents Forum (SARF) through Dr Sandeep Rane, seeking a check on vehicular pollution in the city. In an interim order, the bench has already held that registration of all new private vehicles will not be done unless the vehicle meets EURO I norms by January 1, 2000 and EURO II norms by January 1, 2001.The petition was provided further support by a group of intervenors, like Dr Sudhakar Kamat, Dr Pramod Niphadkar, Brinda Khatau and Bharati Gandhi, who were represented by senior counsel Aspi Chinoy on instructions from advocates Darius Udwadia and Sidhartha Raja. The respondents in the case, numbered to around 20, including the Bombay Taximen's Union, TELCO, Reliance Petrochemicals, FIAT, oil majors like HPCL and BPCL, Western India Automobile Association and various associations of automobile manufacturers.
