Is the Delhi Government's ban on older vehicles a solution or a distraction?

Time of India

2 days ago

Policy in India often lurches backwards before inching forward. The latest example of this is the confusion over end-of-life (EoL) vehicles - petrol cars over 15 years old and diesel ones over 10. After announcing a fuel ban for such vehicles from July 1, as directed by Commission for
Air Quality Management
(CAQM),
Delhi government
put it on hold on Thursday, citing enforcement hurdles and 'technological challenges'. Now, it plans to target only visibly unfit vehicles, sparing well-maintained old cars.
This style of policymaking reflects a paternalistic state that governs by proxy - one more concerned with what is visible, measurable or symbolically satisfying than with tackling deeper, structural issues. Similar tendencies surface in policies like the mandatory setting of AC temperatures. But India is hardly alone in making such decisions.
Sydney's lockout laws, for instance, restricted bar entry times instead of tackling alcohol culture, social isolation or inadequate night transport. NYC's soda-size cap sidestepped predatory marketing that targets children. Singapore's chewing gum ban performed cleanliness without cultivating civic responsibility.
These interventions offer comfort of control and spectacle of action. But they are rituals of avoidance by which the state preserves legibility at the cost of truth.
The decision to ban EoL vehicles in Delhi is a textbook example of what James C Scott, in Seeing Like a State, called a 'high-modernist' impulse: the state's tendency to simplify complex realities into legible, manageable categories.
There are several reasons why the EoL policy is flawed:
Real-world emissions are more closely tied to maintenance quality, driving patterns and after-treatment system functionality than to vehicular age. A well-maintained 10-yr-old car can emit less NOx and PM2.5 than a younger diesel vehicle with a faulty diesel particulate filter (DPF), or selective catalytic reduction system.
Even within the same age bracket, emissions vary dramatically. For instance, a 10-year-old BS-3 diesel car with low mileage and regular servicing may pollute less than a 2-yr-old BS-4 taxi used intensively without adequate maintenance.
Scrapping a 10-yr-old vehicle that passes fitness and emissions tests leads to wasted embedded carbon (i.e., emissions involved in manufacturing the vehicle). This undermines
sustainability
and contradicts circular economy.
Age-based bans penalise private owners who drive relatively little - 3,000-5,000 km/yr - and maintain their vehicles well, while ignoring high-mileage commercial fleets that degrade faster and often emit more. It also ignores that Indians pay up to 50% of a car's value in taxes and treat vehicles as long-term assets. Forcing premature scrappage without commensurate compensation strands private investment, disproportionately hurting middle-class owners and small businesses.
EVs introduce new externalities. Lifecycle analyses show that in coal-heavy grids like India's, large EVs can have comparable or worse net emissions than efficient diesels.
Policy decisions must move beyond instinct and ideology. Each proposal should be accompanied by a metrics-based dashboard: the problem it targets, evidence supporting its efficacy, alternative policy options and measurable success indicators. A normative filter must also ask: is the state displacing individual judgement with its own?
To institutionalise restraint, states should adopt a formal anti-paternalism assessment in their policy-vetting process. This should test whether a measure is proportionate to the harm, preserves autonomy, and avoids treating citizens as incapable of rational choice. Nudges and incentives are acceptable. But coercive defaults must remain rare. The individual who prefers a cooler room, or drives a compliant 10-15-yr-old vehicle is not a governance failure. It is the state that fails when it confuses regulation with correction.