End The Tyranny Of The Vocal Minority Stealing Delhi’s Right To Breathe: End The Burning Of Crop Stubble
Nowadays, it’s almost a ritual. The Delhi air quality is deteriorating in October/November, resulting in finger-pointing and blame games. We then see knee-jerk reactions to reduce pollution, including watering roads, odd-even rules for cars, and smog towers.
Suo motu rulings were given by the National Green Tribunal (NGT), the High Court, and the Supreme Court. Reactions will continue until March, beginning in October/November.
Crop Stubble Burning & Choking Of Delhi
In Delhi, high pollution industries have been relocated to the outskirts, public transportation is moved to CNG, power plant closures have been implemented, strict emissions norms were imposed on vehicles, heavy vehicles have been restricted, and gensets have been restricted.
In the US, NASA maintains a database of fires burning all over the world. Satellite data is collected to create the database. It would be shocking right now if you zoomed in on a map of India on their website. Punjab seems to be on fire at the moment.
A portion of Haryana on the border with Punjab is also in the northern part of the state. With every step away from this belt, the red color fades, leaving only a few scattered red dots. Let’s do something! You will all see it. However, nothing will be done about it. It will not even be discussed.
There is politics in this. The national capital of India is Delhi. From Delhi, India’s media complex and political machinery emanate. The ‘national’ news is usually dominated by incidents in Delhi.
Local problems quickly become national issues in the neighborhoods of Delhi. However, at the moment, the city is in a crisis. In Delhi, as well as in the rest of us, no one seems to be able to discuss it.
There are sterile news reports containing data here and there, for sure. From ‘poor’ to ‘very poor’ to ‘severe’, Delhi’s air quality has gone downhill. According to the Indian Institute of Development Studies (IDS), crop stubble burning contributed 36 percent of Delhi’s air pollution today, 40 percent yesterday, and 35 percent tomorrow.
Strangely, no commentary is provided on these reports. What makes them so fearful? My question here is a bit heretical because it’s obvious. Punjabi farmers have set fire to their fields, along with their counterparts in Haryana, to burn up their leftover crop stubble. Delhi is being burned by the smoke as it moves across northern India. Every year it does this.
Why Do We Let This Happen?
Everyone is exposed to the answer, and it is all around us. Our right to breathe is taken away by a vocal minority in this film. The fact that the political establishment can’t stand up to the majority vote bank of Punjab’s farmers demonstrates its weakness.
What has been referred to as the world’s most powerful court shows its weakness. It also exposes the hypocrisy of NGOs and activists alike. Do they raise millions of dollars by showing their concern for the environment when they’re not jet-setting around the world? To undermine governments they don’t like, they join forces with left-wing parties. Rather than being activists, they are political operatives.
When clarity is so clear, sometimes partisanship is good. Every year, we burn crop stubble and choke Delhi. This same story can be found in the NASA database for October 2019 as well. Punjab and all of Haryana adjacent to it are covered in red.
BJP-ruled Haryana and Congress-ruled Punjab are sister states, but the Haryana administration controls fires far better than the Congress administration. I also mention October 2019 for a reason.
In October, Haryana had elections. Appeasement was the only option for Haryana at that time. Yet Haryana still proved to be a better neighbor than Punjab at the time. India’s liberal record cannot be retracted.
The poor farmers have no choice but to burn away their crop stubble, so what should they do? I am as knowledgeable about Indian agriculture as Rihanna, but I do know that crops are grown all over the country.
Over half of Indians work in agriculture. Punjab’s farmers should understand their responsibility towards the environment if all farmers in other states do. In the name of innocent farmers everywhere, a vocal minority of rich farmers from a state is burning the lungs of northern India. This is not “anti-farmer.”
Because the correlation is so obvious, we cannot ignore the protests against the three new agricultural laws. Across the country, the protests come from the same demographic, with the same sense of entitlement.
As a result, they physically block all roads to Delhi and sit on the highways. In addition to that, every year the capital must submit to severe restrictions for three months. Farmers aren’t all affected by this.
We are talking about only the wealthiest, most privileged elitists, coming from one state, and the most liberal elements in our intellectual and political circles. They are backed up by pseudoscience, as with all misguided initiatives. How can the Air Quality Index (AQI) of cities in Punjab be so much better than that in Delhi, if the pollution comes from crop stubble burning in Punjab?
The graphs of temperature cannot convince climate science deniers. Why are winters still cold if the world is warming? Does the earth fall into space if space is real? We all pay the price for their arrogance and ignorance. As a result, we inhale deadly black smoke into our lungs that harm us in the short run. It also harms us over the long haul. The liberal Left’s hypocrisy makes environmental issues seem trivial.
BJP-led governments want to cut down trees in the Aarey colony in Mumbai to build mass transit systems that will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by millions of tonnes. Hug trees and cry if they do so. Poetically support farmers in Punjab who are burning crop stubble that will suffocate Delhi by writing revolutionary poetry. Environmental concerns become a fashion statement or a political tool when they are reduced to that. This is important to keep in mind.
The kids are incapable of such sophistry, regardless of how clever we adults are. Students today see the world as a game played by adults to settle scores among themselves. The future will belong to these children. We must teach them valuable lessons.
edited and proofread by: nikita sharma
