Byrnihat’s air quality worst in India, says central pollution board report

SHILLONG, Jan 29: Byrnihat was the only town among 231 across India placed in the “severe” category with an air quality index (AQI) of 412, a bulletin of the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) said on Wednesday.
Neighbouring Guwahati, Delhi, Haryana’s Gurugram, and Bihar’s Hajipur and Muzaffarpur were categorised as “very poor”. The remaining urban centres fell under the poor, moderate, and satisfactory categories.
According to the CPCB, the severe category (AQI 401-500) affects healthy people and seriously impacts those with existing diseases.
“Byrnihat straddles Assam and Meghalaya. We are trying to put things in place on the Meghalaya side. It is an ongoing exercise,” an official of the Meghalaya Pollution Control Board (MPCC) said.
Asserting that the data collected over the past two months show an improvement in the pollution level in the Meghalaya part of Byrnihat, the official said: “We have our monitoring mechanism but we are not privy to the data of Assam.”
“If Byrnihat has again been labelled as one of the most polluted urban centres, we have to look at coke plants, cement grinding units, and a lot of other industrial activities going on in the Assam side,” the official said.
The official outlined the initiatives of the MPCB to control the pollution level in Byrnihat.
“We conduct regular inspection and monitoring of the industries granted consent and those found to have violated the norms have been penalised. We have undertaken awareness exercises and are prodding the Transport Department to check the vehicles through the town for pollution levels,” he said.
“Even today, tests were conducted on vehicles plying between Nongpoh and Byrnihat,” he added.
Asked about collaborating with its Assam counterpart, the MPCB official said it can happen at the level of the chairman and the joint secretary.
The primary contributors to Byrnihat’s deteriorating air quality are emissions from 41 industrial units in the region. These include iron and steel plants, cement factories, distilleries, and beverage production units. Many of these factories are accused of operating without adequate pollution control measures, exacerbating the environmental crisis.
In 2023, the CPCB had declared Byrnihat as the most polluted urban centre in the country surpassing the national capital Delhi and all other metropolises and cities, with an AQI of 302 which put it in the category of “very poor”.