No valid pollution certificate? Soon you won't be able to buy fuel in this city

Soon having a valid pollution-under-check certificate will become more important than ever as customers will need to have a valid PUCC in order to purchase fuel in Delhi. The city government will also put a draft policy in this regard in the public domain for inviting suggestions and objections.

As per Environment Minister Gopal Rai, the policy will help curb vehicle pollution in Delhi. "Vehicle owners will have to carry their PUCC to the fuel pump. In case the PUCC is found invalid, they will have to get it reissued at the pump," a statement said.

"This is a very ambitious policy. North India including Delhi faces grave air pollution, particularly in winter. With this policy in place, vehicles will be mandated to have their PUC certificate with them at the fuelling station. Thus, pollution levels of vehicles in the state will be kept in check from time to time," the statement quoted Rai as saying.

Moreover, the government is also planning on introducing several technology-based measures in order to effectively implement the policy and ensure no inconvenience is faced by either vehicle or petrol pump owners. While details of the same remain scarce at the moment, expect the government to introduce the use of technology such as radio-frequency identification systems.

The Delhi government has also recently issued a draft Motor Vehicle Aggregators Scheme, 2021 to boost the adoption of electric vehicles in the country. On similar lines, the government had also previously introduced the Delhi Electric Vehicles policy which aims at increasing the electric vehicle share in total vehicle sales to 25% by 2024. This policy was launched back in August 2020, while only sometime later in October, the city government launched a massive drive to check PUC certificates and deployed around 500 teams at petrol pumps for this purpose.

(With Agency Inputs)