Doing away with the annual sound test for firecrackers will take the city back to a time when there were no restrictions on the noise limit for sound crackers, environment activists have warned.
Metro reported on Tuesday that the sound test — meant to measure the decibel levels of firecrackers — has not been conducted this year. Experts said that without the test, it is impossible to determine whether a cracker meets the legal noise limit.
A permissible noise limit for sound-emitting firecrackers was first set in 1996. Bengal’s cap was stricter than the national standard — 90 decibels measured at five metres from the point of bursting, compared to 125 decibels at four metres elsewhere in the country.
In 2023, however, the Bengal Pollution Control Board (PCB) diluted this standard, issuing an order that raised the permissible limit in the state to 125 decibels at four metres.
Now, with the noise tests skipped, it cannot be known whether crackers even meet this relaxed limit.
“Skipping the noise tests altogether means there is now no check on the sound levels of firecrackers being sold at the Bazi Bazars,” said Biswajit Mukherjee, former chief law officer of the PCB and a former special officer appointed by Calcutta High Court to monitor noise pollution in the state.
(Metro had erroneously mentioned him as a special officer appointed by the high court.)
“No one will know whether the crackers they are buying are within the permissible noise limit. The dividing line between what is legal and illegal has been obliterated,” Mukherjee said. He warned that firecrackers emitting 130 decibels or more could easily enter the market without checks.
Until last year, only those crackers that passed the sound test were cleared for sale at the Bazi Bazars. While high-decibel illegal crackers are available across the city, the
Bazi Bazars were considered safe venues where only compliant products were sold. Skipping the test this year could mean that even excessively loud crackers find
their way into these official fairs.
This year, Bazi Bazars are being held at Shahid Minar ground, Tala Park, Behala Blind School ground, and Aguan Sangha at Kalikapur.
For many rule-abiding Calcuttans, these fairs — supervised by Kolkata Police and the PCB — are trusted sources for buying Diwali crackers.
Organisers said that till last year, sound tests were conducted at a ground near Taratala. But organisers of at least two major Bazi Bazars — at Shahid Minar and Tala Park — confirmed that no such tests were held this year.
Naba Datta, secretary of Sabuj Mancha, a platform of organisations working for environmental protection, called the move “an institutional crime.”
“Whatever little check existed has now disappeared,” Datta said. “Lawlessness related to bursting of crackers will return.”