Big cities, barring Chennai, see a fall in groundwater; Number of trees, birds and animals decline.
How fresh is the air in your city? Or does it pose a health hazard? Air quality in the country’s top six cities has become worse in the last five years, according to a new survey.
Residents of Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Bangalore, Chennai, Kolkata and Hyderabad feel the air quality in their city has “become worse in the last five years or seen no change (no improvement)”, revealed the national environment survey of The Energy and Resources Institute. Ironically, respondents in the national capital were least aware about environment.
Around one-fourth of the respondents of the survey in all the cities suggested improved public transport infrastructure to reduce air pollution and improve air quality.
According to the respondents, the “surface water quality seemed to have deteriorated in all cities apart from Mumbai”.
Moreover, groundwater has been adversely affected, the survey revealed. “Five cities saw a fall in groundwater availability, excluding Chennai. Also, a number of trees, birds and animals saw a decline in all six cities,” the report added.
People of Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi and Hyderabad claimed worsening of waste management in their cities, while residents of Kolkata and Mumbai have witnessed an improvement.
The survey was aimed at gauging people’s perception, behaviour, awareness and opinions pertaining to various environmental issues. A sample of 4,039 people spread across six cities was interviewed for the survey.
The survey revealed that Delhi showed dismal performance in terms of awareness in all domains of environment, with 70-80% of the respondents being unaware of policies on air and water pollution, water availability, waste management, forest conservation and climate change.
Another interesting finding of the survey was that most of the respondents did not agree with the idea of paying the actual cost of water that is supplied to them for the daily usage. “74 per cent respondents in Bangalore, 61 per cent in Delhi, 42 per cent in Chennai, 46 per cent in Mumbai, and 56 per cent in Kolkata did not agree with the idea of paying the actual cost of water (supplied for daily usage),” the report said.
