SC BANS FIRECRACKER DURING DIWALI
According to Wikipedia, India celebrates 151 festivals in a year. That’s a huge number. This means that for almost half of the year we are celebrating something. Diwali is the most famous and largely celebrated holiday in India as it marks the Hindu New Year. It signifies the victory of good over evil.
But for certain years, we are doing more harm than good on this very auspicious day. We are harming the current generation of life as well as the future generation that is yet to come. There something wrong with the way we celebrate it that not only makes us suffer but also our future children.
Due to large scale of bursting firecrackers during this festival it releases harmful gases and toxic substances into the atmosphere, loud noises from loudspeakers and firecrackers, dry waste but now comes a great news of the ban on the most harmful element” crackers”.
SC ORDER
- The Supreme Court on Monday banned the sale of firecrackers in the Delhi-National Capital Region during the upcoming festive season of Diwali, according to several media reports. The ban on sale of firecrackers will apply till 1 November
- In order to bring this into effect, a bench headed by justice A.K. Sikri also held that any temporary licenses issued by the police to firecracker manufacturers would remain suspended for the same time period.
- The court passed this order re imposing its earlier order of 11 November 2016 suspending sale of firecrackers so as to test the suspension order and ascertain its positive effect on the air quality of the NCR region, particularly during the Diwali period.
WHY THE BAN?
- One of the major concerns of a developing nation like us is environmental pollution. On Diwali, pollution just shoots up like a rocket (it goes up by 30%). It is estimated that for every hour of fireworks display, the compound ‘strontium’ increases by 120 times (in small amounts it is harmless but in larger amounts it causes damage to bones and can cause blood clotting disorders) in the air.
- Not only that, but magnesium also increases by 22 times, barium by 12 times, potassium by 11 times and copper by six times. Firecrackers also contain traces of heavy metals that are toxic to the human body.
- Additionally, at this time when issues of climate change and global warming are being presented with a sense of urgency, we need to be concerned about the number of greenhouse gases fireworks produce, which includes Carbon dioxide (CO2) and ozone.
- It’d take the entire lifetime of 5,000 trees to offset the 60,000 tons of carbon emissions produced in this one day!
This will play a crucial role in regulating air pollution in the region and reduce the impact on human health. The ban will ensure that the levels of air pollutants do not reach as high as they did last year around Diwali.
