The High Court rap on the Goa Pollution Control Board and Anjuna Police for failure to control the sound levels of Sunburn held towards the end of December exposes how hollow our sound enforcement is. Moreover, it reflects a sorry state of affairs that authorities are not showing any intent to comply with court directives.
The court said it was shameful and called it deliberate inaction to ensure that sound played at Sunburn venue was below the mandated 55 decibels equivalent at continuous levels. Data presented before the court revealed that noise levels exceeded 65db and, on most occasions, ranged between 70 to 90db.
In a stinging reprimand, the High Court bench of Justices MS Sonak and Bharat Deshpande said, “The court is sorry to record that the authorities seem to take great pride in tolerating the breaching of Noise Pollution Rules and, more particularly, themselves breaching the repeated directions issued by the court to enforce sound regulations. This appears to be a case of deliberate inaction or a lack of will to enforce the law.”
Unfortunately, authorities have shown utter disrespect to the court’s call and have gone about blatantly ignoring violations, even in the most glaring cases. The announcements by the Goa Pollution Control Board asking event managers to install sound measuring systems and uplink them to the server, and another idea of officials moving around with hand-held devices to measure sound at prominent locations appeared to be an eyewash.
The new year’s parties and events that followed the next day went up to 7 am with loud music blaring in the open, causing a nuisance to people. If the court directives are not respected, then there is no hope that authorities will do justice to the job they are entrusted with. The rhetoric of festivity may be tolerable at a certain level, not to a point where the decibels vitiate the environment and create a living hell for residents.
We live in a system where enforcing laws has become a problem, and court intervention has not helped in any way. While the parties have gone on unabated, the reluctance of authorities to act against violations is as clear as daylight. It is bizarre to see the Goa Pollution Control Board officials and Police involved in a blame game before the court, each shirking responsibility by shifting it onto the other.
It is apparent that there is no coordination between GSPCB and Police and which is why the sound monitoring system is failing. It baffles the mind when the DGP says that the Police will only act on complaints made to the control room, clearly indicating that the men in uniform will not act on their own. For the system to work, there has to be seamless coordination between those involved in enforcement, and there has to be accountability. Otherwise, the sound played at any level will always be music to the ears of the law keepers.
Authorities must stop the blame game and the bluff of sincerity they are putting up. The ordinary citizen will always remain a victim if the court intervention, which is considered the last resort, doesn’t help to stop sound violations.
