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Environment Pollution and Protection in India
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Environment
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Introduction
 Overexploitation of the country's resources be it land or water and the industrialization process has resulted in considerable environmental degradation of resources along with the pollution of these and the other environmental parameters. The demographics and socio-economic factors have also influenced the environment, though indirectly. Hence, with an aim to provide a comprehensive picture of India's environment pollution and protection scenario, the State section deals with the analysis of extent of environmental degradation in the country over the years; Pressure section analyses the factors responsible for such changes and the Response section deals with the interventions made by the government by way of policy reforms, institutional, legislative and regulatory mechanisms as well as the non-governmental initiatives, if any. Broadly divided into three chapters - Air, Water and Land, these would almost completely cover the entire spectrum of environment pollution. Land degradation is observed to be largely a rural phenomenon whereas water and air pollution are more pervasive in urban areas. Municipal solid waste too has lately become a major environmental issue of concern especially in the urban areas.
Pollution in India
 Ambient air quality has a significant localized impact and the percentage of population exposed is much higher in urban areas and in particular metropolitan cities. Therefore since these areas have emerged as greatly stressed, the emphasis is on studying the causes for air pollution and interventions to ameliorate the condition in urban areas. Four reasons being - emissions from vehicles, thermal power plants, industries and refineries. The problem of indoor air pollution though an issue of concern in rural areas and urban slums has assumed significant attention lately. Water has been divided into two sections - groundwater and surface water. Groundwater exploitation is a serious matter of concern today and legislations and policy measures taken till date, by the state governments (water is a state subject) have not had the desired effect on the situation. Agriculture, forestry and mining being the three most important activities effecting land use and degradation, a sectoral impact of each of these can been discussed separately.
 Municipal solid waste is limited to the solid waste generated by households, commercial establishments and offices and does not include the industrial or agricultural waste. Municipal solid waste management is more of an administrative and institutional mechanism failure problem rather than a technological one, hence the number of non-governmental initiatives in solving the same have been
many. Environmental movements arise largely due to the clash between economic development and exploitation of natural resources in the process of doing so. People in different parts of India have participated in such movements in the past and these are raged even today when the supposedly development projects, taken up in the name of prosperity and better living conditions, affect the local people adversely. Movements were/are meant as means to safeguard the interests of people (generally poorest and marginalised sections of society) over and above the endless aspirations of decision makers to promote extensive industrial activity and expansion of energy and resource in the context of limited resource availability. Such as against dams, mineral resources, exploitation of forest resources, natural disasters and major chemical accidents/incidents.
Trends in population growth and environmental degradation
 The issues of population, environment and development should be treated not as separate sets of issues, but as three interactive factors. Considerable debate has taken place in recent years on the complex issue of the environmental implications of population change. The rapid population growth, which affects patterns of production and consumption is a principal source of pressure on the environment especially in a developing country like India. The environment has to sustain not only the basic human needs for survival, but also the conversion of raw materials into products and services. India is the second largest populous country of the world, with its current population figures standing at one billion. Of this, 276 million people reside in urban areas implying urbanization level of 28.9%. The urbanization levels of the country have been increasing consistently since 1971. Almost 20 % of the country's population lived in the urban areas in 1971, while in 1991 the figure had risen to approximately 26%. Most of this urban population is concentrated in the Class I cities (cities with a population of 100,000 and above). The total population in the metros accounts for nearly one-third of total urban population. Over 50% of the population of these metros lives in the five giant conglomerates - Mumbai, Kolkata, Delhi, Chennai, and Bangalore.
Courtesy: Gurneeta Vasudeva
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