Centre releases Rs 2,200 cr as first installment of grant-in-aid for improving air quality

The money has been disbursed to the states on the recommendations of the 15 th Finance Commission to curb air pollution in their million plus cities.

Sitharaman said the grant will enable the beneficiary states to undertake air quality measures, including capacity-building of the local bodies within their million-plus cities/agglomerations.

The local bodies of the cities like Lucknow, Visakhapatnam, Kolkata would receive the grant grants-in-aid directly within working days of receipt from the Union Government without any deduction, the ministry said in a statement.

"Any delay beyond ten working days will require the State Governments to release the same with interest as per the effective rate of interest on market borrowings/State Development Loans (SDLs) for the previous year," it further added.

Each local body named in the list should entrust an urban local body as nodal organisation to receive the grants and should also be responsible for ensuring the performance indicators for the entire urban agglomeration are met, the ministry's statement said.

 The grants, the Central government said, should also meet "the additional needs of State Pollution Control Boards to appropriately assist the local bodies in monitoring the ambient air quality."