When Guwahati Was Projected As Severely Polluted

Nava Thakuria

Rapid urbanization in the last few decades has made Guwahati a polluted city, but can it feature on top of a list comprising the regions containing highly polluted air across the Asian region? The issue came for discussions as an air quality monitoring body (IQAir) recently revealed that the virtual capital of northeast India emerged as the second highest polluted city in the continent. Many jumped into the revelation of ‘World Air Quality Report 2023’ and started making voluminous reports in various media outlets terming the prehistoric city as an unhealthy place for human habitation.

Now the question that arises, should not one need institutional education and also wisdom to report a scientific survey based on technical finding. The media outlets in Guwahati are often observed as being jubilant to get an opportunity to defame the governments in Dispur and New Delhi. Doing so, they even defame their own place and the people. While reporting on IQAir index, the editor-journalists set aside any local scientific agency (on pollution) or individuals to pronounce their verdict.

Amazingly, the IQAir list put Begusarai of Bihar at the top. For hours the news rolled from newspapers, news channels to alternate media outlets and finally spread to common people to create a panicky situation primarily among the Guwahatians. Later, the Pollution Control Board, Assam (PCBA) came out with a strong argument denouncing the IQAir findings. Terming the media reports as misleading, the PCBA clarified that Guwahati was yet to arrive at that position cited by the Swish air quality monitoring agency.

The IQAir reported PM 2.5 concentration in Guwahati for the year 2023 as high as 105.4 µg/m3, which is more than Delhi (92.7 µg/m3). These misleading reports are causing panic among the people in Assam and the PCBA clarified that there was no need to panic as the air pollution level (PM 2.5 concentration) in Guwahati is absolutely under control (52.8 µg/m3 in 2023). The average PM 2.5 concentration in Guwahati city for 2022 was 52.61 µg/m3. All this data contradicts the report of IQAir, whose data collection procedures are not disclosed.

For records, IQAir is a private company on environmental technology based in Goldach of Switzerland. Founded in 1963, the air quality technology company produces air purifiers. It specializes in protection against airborne pollutants, developing air quality monitoring & air cleaning products, and also operates AirVisual, a real-time air quality information platform. As of February 2020, it had around 500 employees worldwide, 150 of them in China, and its most important markets were Asia and North America. As of 2015, IQAir was a family-owned company and it did not publish concrete information about its revenue or profits.

Responding to queries from this writer, Natasha Ganes of IQAir, stated that the organization collects data from government-operated regulatory monitors, including those monitored by the PCBA, as well as low-cost sensor stations. Any city ranked in the 2023 World Air Quality report, particularly near the top of the list, is always vetted closely by the air quality science team. In Guwahati, only government data was available and was therefore the only data source used in determining the city's annual average PM2.5 concentration, asserted Natasha, adding that IQAir is a politically-neutral organization that tries to empower individuals, organizations and governments to improve air quality.

“IQAir collects real-time air quality data every hour throughout the year and when generating the global air quality report, we use all publicly available air quality data. The more monitors we have in an area, the better the air quality information will be. This is another key reason why it is important to expand the air quality monitoring network. Expanding the network to specifically monitor the most populated areas would provide data-driven evidence of the hyper-local air quality conditions that citizens experience there,” stated Natasha.

Speaking to this writer, PCBA chairman Arup Kr Misra clarified that the amount of PM 2.5 is a key indicator of air quality where PM stands for particulate matter that may be solid or liquid and 2.5 refers to the diameter of the matter which is 2.5 micrometres or smaller (around 3% of the diameter of a human hair). On the other hand, the unit µg/m3 stands for micrograms (one-millionth of a gram) per cubic metre of air. Assam government under the National Clean Air Program (NCAP) has been implementing various action plans to improve the ambient air quality in Guwahati along with Nagaon, Nalbari, Sivasagar and Silchar, added Misra.

Various stakeholders (government departments & agencies) help to implement the NCAP action plans which helps in maintaining air quality in populous cities in terms of average PM 2.5 concentration in 2023 (52.8 µg/m3) and 2022 (52.61 µg/m3). Probably, the poor quality air (as portrayed by the IQAir report and subsequently highlighted by various print and electronic media outlets) would have a far-reaching manifestation in normal life and activities of Guwahatians, stated Misra, adding that they have already urged the governments and Central Pollution Control Board to enquire into the matter and take necessary actions.