Construction Sites Major Contributors To Air Pollution, 'Bhattis' In Hotels & Bakeries Should Also Be Regulated: Bombay High Court

The Bombay High Court on Thursday slammed the Maharashtra government and also the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) for their failure to reduce the air pollution levels in Mumbai and nearby cities and act against the major contributors to the pollution, particularly the bakeries in the city.

A division bench of Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyay and Justice Girish Kulkarni asked the BMC to take some action against the 'bhattis' used in bakeries, hotels and also for preparing food in small gatherings.

"Third highest contributors for air pollution in the city are the bhattis in bakeries, hotels, dhabas etc... Is there any statutory regulatory regime available either with BMC or the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB) or any department of the State government, where licensing of the bhattis is required? Then we can impose a condition that new licences will be issued only if they do away with using wood and coal," the Chief Justice observed.

Senior Advocate Milind Sathe representing the BMC, however, informed the bench that already notices have been issued to such bhattis to switch to alternate modes within a year.

Weighing in State's Advocate General Birendra Saraf too submitted, "Milords, if they do not switch to the alternate modes, further action will be taken. But yes, till then they can use the wood (which is not painted) and coal, provided they do not cross the permissible levels."

Senior Advocate Darius Khambatta, who is also the Amicus Curiae in the Suo Motu matter, however, flagged various lapses on part of the authorities like no check on the transport of debris, within the city, no proper check on traffic, no stringent stand or action against construction sites, which is the major contributor of air pollution in the city.

"Usually, October is a clear month since it is just after monsoon ends. But the air started deteriorating this time, from October 2024 itself. Construction sites stand first in the list of contributors to air pollution followed by heavy industries, which are classified as red industries and then the third contributor is these bhattis. Some action against construction sites is needed," the Amicus submitted.

Khambatta also highlighted the latest affidavit of the BMC in which, he said the civic body expressed its inability to control air pollution from construction sites.

Countering this, Sathe told the court that development too is important for the city.

At this, CJ Upadhyay interjected, saying, "Mr Sathe, we do not appreciate the stand of the BMC. You cannot always say it is environment vs development. It cannot be a submission always. There is something called as sustainable development too. You tell us what measures have you taken till now. We can say that the measures you took till date have not abated the situation. When will you take the actually needed measures? When will the pollution levels come down? We can't compare ourself to Delhi...Bombay has location advantage but Delhi does not... You need to put your house in order and monitor ward wise and fix accountability.... Only then the situation may improve..."

Also present for Vanshakti, an NGO intervening in the matter, Senior Advocate Janak Dwarkadas, pointed out that the countries like Thailand have electronic devices put up near each construction site displaying a real time information of the air pollution level and also the noise pollution levels due to the construction activity at each site.

"The devices from Bangkok are already available in India...Nagar Nigam of Firozabad in Uttar Pradesh is already using such devices...For projects going on in Mumbai, a condition can be imposed on them to display real time display of air quality and noise pollution by using these devices... So that people in the area know what is the pollution in their area. All these can be linked with a central dashboard, which can be monitored by the corporation and the pollution control boards, so that it can be ascertained who is polluting the air more and accordingly action can be initiated," Dwarkadas submitted.

However, the judges focused on the issue of bhattis contributing to the city's polluted air.

Justice Kulkarni on the bench, sought to know suggestions from Khambatta and Dwarkadas as to what the authorities can do in such extreme situations.

"What is your suggestion for extreme situations... Causes are broadly with us... Specifically it starts after Diwali... What can be done by the authorities to handle these extreme and intense situations.... Suppose we say burning of fire crackers should be 8PM to 10PM but implementing agencies didn't work and we saw firecrackers even at 1 in the night..." Justice Kulkarni said.

To this, Khambatta responded, "Milords, firecrackers are for a brief period... But construction is going on 24X7.."

"But then everything is to be seen together contributing to air pollution including traffic jams on the roads with 1000s of cars emitting smoke at one time and polluting the air," Justice Kulkarni replied.

Meanwhile, the bench also suggested phasing out petrol and diesel vehicles from roads of the city.

"We do not want to copy Delhi but yes you can consider permitting only CNG and electric vehicles and phasing out diesel and petrol ones," the Chief Justice suggested.

The bench, however, adjourned the hearing saying it would pass a detailed order.