About 150 delegates from across Gurugram including NGOs, environmentalist, doctors, RWA officials, urban body officials, officials from Haryana Pollution Control Board, town planners came together in a workshop organised by Gurgaon First.
Every year. with the onset of winters, the air pollution increase to abnormal levels and the situation is worsening each year. For the past few days, the air quality index has been consistently over 330 translating to “very poor”. There is public outcry, even outrage and media attention to highlight the deteriorating air quality in NCR. Leave aside vulnerable sections, haze and dust particles in the air is being felt by all citizens. This can potentially trigger asthma, allergies and other complicated respiratory conditions, blood pressure, increase the incidence of heart stokes and other cardio vascular diseases.
The workshop assessed the pollution levels, listed the main causes for it and tried to evaluate what can be practically done to combat this menace at an individual, community and city level. It had presentation and discussions on real time air pollution data; discussion of the problems and solutions by experts, discussion on Impact on quality of life and diseases, and an interaction with the authorities. The key speakers were Dr Manas Fuloria, CEO, Nagarro, Anumita Roychowdhary, Executive Director, Centre for Science and Environment, Amit Bhat, Director WRI India, Rajiv Banga, MD & CEO, IL&FS Rail Ltd (Rapid Metro), Lt Col. Prakash Tewari, Executive Director (CSR), DLF Ltd, Chetan Agarwal, Environmental analyst, Gurugram, Dr Vivek Nangia, Pulmonary Specialist, Fortis Hospital, Gurugram, Ms Neela Kaushik, Founder Gurgaon Moms, Sudhir Singh Chauhan, Senior Town Planner, Municipal Corporation of Gurugram.