With Delhi’s pollution levels alarmingly high, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) decision to ban 10-year old diesel vehicles in the Capital is most welcome. Enforcement of ban, however, calls for consideration to the vehicle owners forced to junk their healthy assets. There has been no word yet on any incentive even as that is the global norm. Drivers scrapping diesel-powered cars are being incentivized to go electrical with a bonus of up to $13,500 in France. In Austria 13 year old vehicles are junked but owners given 1500 Euros to scrap them while as Germany pays car owners whose cars are 9 years old 2500 Euros. Portugal, Slovakia, Egypt, and Mauritius are among countries that incentivize phase out of polluting vehicles. With neither any incentive nor a scrapping mechanism in place, isn’t pollution being exported to smaller towns of India?
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