RAWALPINDI: The Punjab Environment Protection Agency (EPA) has failed to check air quality in downtown areas of the garrison city as there is still no system installed in Raja Bazaar, Murree Road and Pirwadhai areas.

With the start of October, the number of patients suffering from flu, allergy, cough and fever has started increasing mostly due to air pollution.

Doctors say air of the city is polluted with carbon dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and sulphur dioxide and when people inhale the polluted air it starts irritating their upper respiratory system.

Dr Ijaz Butt, Medical Superintendent (MS) of Holy Family Hospital, said that the health of our skin, lungs, kidneys and entire respiratory system is affected by the quality of air we breathe.

Industrial units set up in residential areas add to pollution

He said with the rising of population, the air quality had been deteriorating, so people mostly got affected in October to February.

He said smoke emitted from vehicles and industrial units added to the spread of different allergies. Old-age people, children and people with asthma come to hospitals with complaints of flu, eye allergy, difficulty in breathing and other complaints.

The air quality in thickly-populated areas in and around Raja Bazaar, Murree Road, Tench Bhatta, Pirwadhai and narrow lanes of the downtown areas is degrading with each passing day due to smoke emitting from small industrial units and workshops. Small industrial units have been established in the thickly-populated areas in violation of government laws, but no action is taken against them.

Under the law, residential areas cannot be used for commercial activities but the violation of the law seems not visible to Rawalpindi Municipal Corporation (RMC). The illegal factories mostly prepare polythene bags, plastic chapals and other products. During the process, smoke emitting from these outlets adds to the air as well as noise pollution.

A senior official of the RMC told Dawn that air and noise pollution had increased in Rawalpindi and there was a need to stop the activities that produced carbon dioxide.

He said waste generated from these factories was also dumped in Leh Nullah without adopting safety measures which polluted the groundwater. He said that for the establishment of a factory or other industrial units, permission from EPA Punjab was required.

“It is the duty of EPA Punjab local chapter to check the illegal units and protect the city form air pollution,” he said.

When contacted, Civil Defence Officer Talib Hussain said that it was the duty of the environment department to take action against illegal factories.

“We just check fire safety measures in legal industrial units, commercial buildings, petrol and CNG filling stations,” he said.

On the other hand, the EPA Punjab local chapter claimed that the air quality of Rawalpindi was satisfactory as Air Quality Index (AQI) value was 54 on Saturday. However, these figures are taken at Shallay Valley on Range Road which was far from main commercial hubs and thickly populated areas.

Environment department Inspector Inamul Haq told Dawn that the department was taking action against brick kilns which had not been converted into on zigzag technology. He said 18 such brick kilns were razed in the district.

He said that four pyrolysis plants had also been demolished which were involved to burning tyres for fuel. He admitted that the air quality test was conducted at Shallay Valley Range Road, claiming that the air quality had improved because of action taken by the environment department.

However, he admitted that there was no checking of air quality in main commercial and thickly-populated areas. He failed to answer why the action had not been taken against illegal small units in the downtown which were creating pollution.

Published in Dawn, October 27th, 2024