The Supreme Court on Tuesday (November 7) questioned the effectiveness of the Delhi Government's "odd-even" scheme in controlling air pollution, while terming it as “optics”. Under this scheme, vehicles with license plate numbers ending in an even digit are allowed to operate on even dates, while those ending in odd digits can ply on odd dates.

The Court, while noting the submission of Senior Advocate Aparajita Singh (Amicus), that the scheme is unscientific, asked the Delhi government to report back on the restrictions to be taken by the State based on color-coded stickers instead. It may be noted that orange tag represents diesel vehicles and blue tag is for CNG and petrol vehicle. On the basis of this, Singh had suggested that vehicles with orange stickers be banned. 

It was also directed that while the color-coded scheme has been already implemented by Delhi Government, the same shall be implemented by the adjacent states as well. 

“Ld. Amicus Aparajita Singh points out that in order to control vehicular pollution, the color-coded sticker was envisaged…it appears that the same has been implemented only by the Delhi govt while it has to be implemented even by the adjacent states. No compliance report has been filed. The states to obtain instructions. It is thus suggested that the Delhi Government is seeking to impose restrictions on the basis of “odd-even”. Singh submits that it is really unscientific manner and….instead vehicles with orange stickers can be banned.,” Justices 

Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Sudhanshu Dhulia. 

Accordingly, the Court directed the Delhi Government to report back on this aspect. 

The Court also noted that there may be a large numbers of taxis in Delhi which have registrations in different states. It thereby also directed Delhi Government to ensure that only the taxis registered in Delhi are plying in the capital as large number of taxis from other states carrying only one passenger are plying in the national capital region.

"If one looks at the roads, each one of them invariably carry one passenger. We would like to know whether there is any way of monitoring especially during these period of time that only the taxis registered in Delhi are permitted…as an additional measure to control pollution."

The Court also directed the government to place the Environment Compensation Charge which has been collected and also in what manner the same has been utilized.

Court-Room Exchange

You have said that you have imposed the alternative cars (even-odd), did it succeed earlier? These are all optics; this is the problem.

During the hearing, Senior Advocate Aparajita Singh, who was amicus in the matter pointed out that in order to get over this situation another color-coded scheme was suggested. 

“To get over this situation we had suggested orange tag for diesel vehicle and blue tag for CNG and petrol vehicle. It has been rolled out. Now, all the cars have hologram stickers on the dashboard where you can identify whether the car is a diesel or the petrol car. More scientific, of doing it would be to ban orange stickers (cars) rather than banning CNG cars."

Concurring with her argument, another counsel chimed in submitting that an order regarding color-coded scheme was already passed back in December 2022. Therein, the Court passed the directions to all the concerned states to ensure that the scheme is implemented. “

The states have not even filed the compliance so far….Something needs to be implemented. This compliance has to happen.,” the counsel argued. 

Moving ahead, Singh submitted that the same has been implemented in Delhi thus, it can be used to bar the orange stickers (which represents diesel vehicles). 

“It has been implemented in Delhi and the Delhi Government could use it to ban orange stickers.”