Recently, India was in the news again as a world leader - but this time for the wrong reason. According to the Swiss firm IQAirʼs assessment of the air quality of world cities 2023, New Delhi is back to being the worldʼs most polluted capital. New Delhiʼs annual air quality rating is 19 times the World Health Organizationʼs annual limit recommended in 2021 for its pollutant level. The picture is no better as far as the larger Union Territory of Delhi is considered - its annual record of pollutant levels makes it the third most polluted region globally.
Delhi may have hogged the headlines on air pollution, but the problem is far from unique to metropolises. IQAirʼs findings reveal that even lower-tier cities and towns in India are choking because of very poor air quality. Indeed, Begusarai in Bihar is the worldʼs most polluted city. Partly industrialized, housing among others an oil refinery, Begusarai is primarily agrarian. And Begusarai is not an outlier: Mullanpur in Punjab, which is
transitioning to an urban settlement, and Siwan in Bihar are among the 42 Indian cities/towns that are among the 50 most polluted globally.
Many judicial pronouncements have upheld “the right to clean airˮ as a corollary to the fundamental right to life and pushed governments to act. But Delhiʼs bad air is despite the introduction of CNG in public transport and the building of a metro network in the early years of this decade, and in spite of the presence of a Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) that kicks in when the air quality turns bad and becomes more stringent as the air quality worsens.
Improving air quality across Indian cities requires three fundamental changes. One, governments must turn to science to understand, measure, and monitor the problem. Two, they have to understand that the response will have to include behavioural changes and use a combination of incentives and penalties to achieve this. And three, clean air has to be seen as a common public good. To be sure, it is not just the responsibility of the Centre or a battle for courts to wage, but a fight that states and municipal governments have to be a part of. This is the battle for our future.
Based on the information in the passage, which one of the following statements is correct?
The passage doesnt say Delhi's air quality is the poorest in the entire world; the passage says: [ New Delhi is back to being the worldʼs most polluted capital. New Delhiʼs annual air quality rating is 19 times the World Health Organizationʼs annual limit recommended in 2021 for its pollutant level. The picture is no better as far as the larger Union Territory of Delhi is considered - its annual record of pollutant levels makes it the third most polluted region globally.] Not once do they mention Delhi as the city with the poorest air quality in the world, so Option A is not a correct inference.
The problem of air pollution is limited to the major cities in India is not correct as well, as the passage says [...but the problem is far from unique to metropolises.] This refutes the claim made in option B.
The passage also states : [... the 42 Indian cities/towns that are among the 50 most polluted globally.] which indicates that 42 of the 50 are in India, not all of the 50. Option C is therefore a stretch, and hence not correct as well.
Option D is correct, because we find in the passage :[Begusarai in Bihar is the worldʼs most polluted city. Partly industrialized, housing among others an oil refinery, Begusarai is primarily agrarian.] which tells us that in spite of being an agro-dependent place, Begusarai is the most polluted. The pollution can be attributed to the partly industrialised side of Begusarai, as not a lot of air pollution occurs due to agriculture. There is a bit of ambiguity in this, although the other three are directly refuted by the passage. The correct answer in this case is therefore option D.
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