The Arvind Kejriwal government’s Odd-Even scheme will continue till January 15 as planned, the Delhi High Court ruled today and said it would continue hearing petitions challenging the new traffic rules on February 15. The court said it would “not interfere with the notification” that allows only cars with odd-numbered licence plates on Delhi’s roads on odd-numbered dates, and those with even-numbered plates on the other days till this Friday. The government, the judges said, could consider some of the points raised by petitioners on Odd-Even.
On Friday the court had reserved judgement on whether the scheme should be allowed to run till January 15, but criticised the city’s public transport as “insufficient” and observed that people were inconvenienced. It had earlier asked why the the Delhi government’s experiment to ban private cars on alternate days should last more than a week. The Delhi government said yesterday that air pollution caused by vehicular traffic has declined by 50 per cent in the national capital. “More than 50 per cent drop in air pollution primarily caused by vehicular traffic has been recorded according to the latest ambient air data collected by mobile teams of Delhi Pollution Control Committee on Saturday at 18 locations, through mobile dust samplers on using the light scattering technique,” it said in a statement.
Scientists said good weather has helped improve air quality. The Delhi government noted that scientists have consistently said the moment weather conditions improve, the results of the odd-even formula will show immediate results. The Aam Aadmi Party government has said it will analyse data after January 15; it said a fortnight’s run was necessary to correctly assess the potential of the new restrictions in improving the quality of the city’s air. The Delhi government has also committed to improving public transport by providing more buses and metro train runs for commuters. Schools in the capital have been ordered to remain closed till January 15, partly so that their buses can be used to ferry commuters to work.
