PTI, CHANDIGARH: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and his Haryana counterpart Manohar Lal Khattar today resolved to put in “sustained efforts” to check pollution and discussed measures to ensure smog does not envelop the national capital in the winter of 2018. Kejriwal held a nearly 90-minute meeting at Khattar’s residence here and it primarily centred around air pollution and stubble burning that is a major contributory factor to smog, which has engulfed the national capital and parts of Haryana and Punjab over the past nearly two weeks.
Kejriwal said that states may be separated by territorial boundaries, but nobody has control over air and joint efforts need to be put in by all stakeholders to check pollution. “Therefore, it is very important that the country’s top political executive, both of states and the Centre, everyone will have to collectively find a solution to this problem,” he said.
“I believe today’s meeting is just a beginning. It is an indication that to deal with this problem, we are ready to take whatever steps are required to be taken. We had a discussion on crop burning, on vehicular pollution, as also on bypasses which are being built, we had a discussion on how we can introduce CNG vehicles.
A joint statement was issued after the meeting, in which their environment ministers and other top officials also participated. “We the chief ministers of Delhi and Haryana are happy to have had a very fruitful meeting at Chandigarh today. We recognised our deep and shared concern over the recent episode of heavy smog in our National Capital Region. We agreed upon the need for action on many measures aimed at preventing its re-occurrence in the winter of 2018,” according to the statement.
