Mumbai: City-based NGO Awaaz Foundation has written to chief minister Eknath Shinde and police commissioner Vivek Phansalkar about the noise pollution during the Eid celebrations at Mohammed Ali Road near JJ Hospital.
The noise levels in the locality shot up to 116.3 decibels owing to DJ’s blasting music.
“Every ten decibels mean the noise levels have doubled. This means that the noise levels at these places were 70 or 80 times above the permissible limits,” said the founder of the NGO Sumaira Abdulali.
Areas near schools and hospitals are supposed to have a maximum of 55-decibel noise levels in the daytime and 45 decibels at night.
In the letter Abdulali, she mentioned the decibel levels at Mohammed Ali Road and Byculla. The noise levels at the two places recorded on Sunday during the Eid-e-Milad celebrations were 116.3 decibels and 112.5 decibels respectively. She also mentioned this was in defiance of Supreme Court (SC) as well as Bombay high court (HC) orders regarding noise pollution.
“I went around Mohammed Ali Road between JJ Hospital and Crawford market on Sunday night and saw that besides the DJs armed with stereo systems mounted on decorated trucks, blaring music through amplifiers and loudspeakers. These systems are banned by the police. The Supreme Court has even devised zone-wise decibel limits,” said Abdulali. The scene at Byculla was no different, she added.
She also mentioned a 2016 Bombay high court judgement in which the court said that religion or religious celebration cannot be grounds for violating the noise rules. She is even more concerned about the rules being broken in a silent zone near JJ Hospital as it could adversely affect the health of several patients. “During the festivals, I end up getting 8-10 such noise complaints from around the city. Police aren’t much help even when someone approaches them,” said Abdulali. She also said that police officer were, in fact, present at many of the sites while the noise rules were being openly flouted.
She also appealed to the police in the letter to take stern action against the erring parties.