Kochi : Residents of Ambalamugal have come up with allegations that the air quality in the area has dipped severely in the past couple of weeks. But the PCB officials said that there isn’t severe pollution in the city and suburbs.




According to locals, thick fog can be visible in the area, especially in the morning and evening. “Our area has been suffering from severe air and water pollution for several years. For the past couple of weeks, the situation has worsened. The fog reminds us of the climatic condition in cities like Delhi,” said Ambalamugal southwest residents association president Pramod Lukose . “It is during cloudy atmosphere that the pollution rate worsens. On sunny days, the polluted air will go up and dissolve. During rainy days, the pollutants that stay afloat in the air would get dissolved in the raindrops. So, the air pollution in our area would be high during Oct-Feb. No govt agency including the pollution control board takes any steps to rein in the industrial giants which pollute the entire area,” he added. “Though some of the industrial units in the area claim that they have installed ambient air monitoring devices on their premises, their systems do not seem to work properly. When a massive fire broke out on the solid waste treatment plant premises in March 2023, the air monitoring systems at these firms, which are very close to the plant, did not raise any alarm,” Lukose said.




“Though we acclimatized to the impact of pollution, it is slowly killing us,” he said.




PCB officials in Ernakulam said they have no information on the pollution caused by poor air quality index . The two air quality monitoring stations in Kaloor and Vyttila have not been functioning for the past two to three years. PCB takes manual data in Vyttila.




Environmentalists deplore what they call “inefficiency” in the manner in which the agencies like PCB operate. “PCB has failed to act properly to control the industries causing pollution,” said C M Joy , environmentalist.