Emerging Public Health Concern and Air Pollution: A Case Study of Delhi’s Air Pollution Governance

Abstract

Air Pollution is a major concern in today’s scenarios as it is leading to serious health hazards and also retrograding our environment. In recent times there has been a rapid increase in various health factors which has affected lives at a very vast scale. Talking about air pollution in cities like Delhi and other metro cities where air pollution is at its peak. Talking about Delhi which is sometimes also referred as ‘Gas Chamber’ has been a research model for managing risk and controlling air pollution in mounting and towards making Delhi's environment healthy. In this research paper we are trying to understand air pollution governance as a means of risk management. Delhi which follows multi-level governance where public health emergencies in recent times, keeping public trust doctrine as the conceptual basis to look at governance. Delhi traversing as National Capital Territory can be considered as a victim of the Air Pollution and its consequent impacts. The lack of integrated approach in Delhi for risk governance has made this process multifaceted and a challenging task. This study can enlighten us on emergence of public health concerns due to air pollution and its governance, keeping in consideration it has not kept an equal balance even with the backing of legislative measures and intervention of court laws. Due to increasing air pollution levels in the city, right to Life and right to a Healthy Environment are being violated from which the levels of air quality continues to be poor. Lastly for which good governance is required in order to reduce the same at this pandemic.