Centre, Delhi govt under lens for hiring diesel cars

TALKING TOUGH EPCA says the Union and Delhi governments are using private diesel cars as taxis for commuting within NCR in violation of apex court orders

NEWDELHI: The Supreme Court-appointed Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority (EPCA) on Friday said that both the Centre and Delhi government are hiring private diesel cars and using them as taxis for commuting within Delhi -NCR, flouting orders.

“It has been brought to our notice that the Union and Delhi government are using private diesel cars as taxis for commuting within Delhi-ncr. This is in contravention of the Supreme Court order, which clearly says that all taxis will have to operate on dualfuel or run purely on CNG or petrol,” said Sunita Narain, member of EPCA.

In May this year, the apex court had said that no new diesel taxis will be registered in Delhi. All registration of city taxis shall only be permitted if the vehicles operate on dual-fuel, or purely CNG or petrol.

More than 25,000 such vehicles are being hired by the Union government, Delhi government and public sector units, an EPCA member said. Narain said she would soon write to both the Union and state government to raise the issue.

“The EPCA will first find out whether such practice is actually prevalent. If yes, then what remedial measures the governments could take,” said Narain after a meeting with cab aggregators, taxi associations and government officials. In the meeting, it was also suggested that EPCA propose to the governments that only CNG vehicles are hired.

But a senior government official said it will not be feasible for the government to shift to 100% CNG vehicles, as many vehicles often need to move out of NCR where CNG infrastructure is still absent or in a rudimentary stage.

The cab aggregators operating in Delhi-ncr informed the Sc-appointed body that less than 2% of their vehicles are presently running on diesel.