While Volkswagen is gearing up to recall cars in the emissions scandal, the National Green Tribunal is pleading the Centre to to ban sales of Volkswagen cars in India.
In what comes as a not-so-surprising move, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) has asked the Centre to ban the sale of Volkswagen cars in India, following the recent dieselgate scandal which was exposed worldwide. Volkswagen had flouted a lot of emission tests, including in India and their vehicles were emitting nitrogen oxide that was nine times more than the allowed limit which was just shocking. The ARAI had conducted their own tests too and concluded that Volkswagen was indeed cheating and asked the company to give a reply by the end of November.
Volkswagen India responded to ARAI recently and confirmed that more than 3 lakh cars in India were affected by the EA 189 scam and the company would be recalling all of them for rectifying the issue. The National Green Tribunal, headed by Justice Swatanter Kumar has plead the Ministry of Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises, Ministry of Environmental Forest and Climate Change and the Central Pollution Control Board to ban the manufacturing, assembly and sale of Volkswagen products in India.
The Ministries have been asked to reply by 23rd December. The plea was made after a hearing by a Delhi-based teacher Saloni Ailawadi who sought the disallowance on Volkswagen products in India, based on the recent ARAI report of how the company has been flouting emission norms and how Volkswagen is showing a blatant disregard for the environment by polluting so much. The teacher said that she was deeply concerned on account of the company’s admitted calculated and deliberate deceit of environmental norms thereby endangering lives of Indian and global citizens.
Things are going to take a very interesting turn now. While Volkswagen has issued a recall for the cars, it remains to be seen how efficient they are in fixing things and how many owners actually turn up for the recall. There are quite a few who would be ignorant regarding all this so Volkswagen should really be strict and make sure every car gets fixed. What is also going to be interesting is how the Ministry replies to the NGT’s plea.
