New Delhi, Sep 28 The Delhi High Court on Monday issued notices to the Union government and others on a petition for court directions to authorities concerned to initiate immediate steps to prevent stubble-burning in Punjab, Haryana, and Uttar Pradesh amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The petition also sought directions for sending teams of experts to the three states for implementing effective measures to curb stubble-burning.
A Division Bench of Chief Justice DN Patel and Justice Prateek Jalan issued notices for reply and posted the matter for further hearing on October 22.
The petitioner's counsel told the court that stubble-burning in neighbouring states had led to significant increase of about 40-50% in air pollution in the region.
"Now, the situation is different and something has to be done on a warfooting as the pandemic is directly connected to the lungs and air pollution will pose a greater threat," the petitioner said.
The stubble-burning will lead to a massive increase in the number of emergency cases in the current pandemic situation, the petitioner contended.
The said application has been moved in an ongoing 2015 matter related to air pollution.
The plea filed by Sudhir Mishra through advocate Petal Chandhok and advocate Ritwika Nanda also submitted that there was an increase of 6 per cent in stubble-burning incidents in the last one week.
( With inputs from IANS )
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