Polishing up a silver lining is a rewarding activity, since there are not too many of them around. The West Bengal pollution control board has decided to build on its success of reducing noise pollution during the festive season. The last three years have seen a definite scaling down in the noise of crackers and loudspeakers during Durga Puja and Diwali and a general compliance with the time limits set down by the board. This year, however, there is something new. The board is now empowered to put cases directly under the recently introduced Environmental Pollution Act, which provides for a fine upto Rs 1 lakh and imprisonment if presidents and secretaries of puja committees are found guilty of violating the norms. The cases will also be registered under the Police Act. The board has stuck to its noise limit of 90 decibels at five metres, refusing to entertain requests from firecracker dealers that the limit be raised to 125 decibels, which is the national standard. There are also very clear guidelines for monitoring noise levels with a central booth and mobile teams. Loudspeakers blaring beyond the prescribed time limits will bring on the wrath of the board too. The board's determination has shown good results so far, but there is perhaps one feature that should be emphasized. The results would have been very different had there not been cooperation from the people of Calcutta and its surrounding areas. The credit can be claimed by the WBPCB on the basis of its awareness programmes. But it is a sad truth that numerous such programmes regarding other equally or more urgent issues have failed miserably. There is no reason why the WBPCB's sound pollution programme should work so miraculously. It has to be acknowledged that however impalpably, there is a gradual cultural shift going on. People are generally more conscious about the harm noise does, or are simply irritated by loud noise at all hours of the day. Ideas about festivity and enjoyment are changing too. There is markedly less enthusiasm about the local puja, a better understanding of the economics of such festivity, a disaffection, for better or worse, among a large segment of young adults towards certain forms of cultural excess. The WBPCB's intervention comes at a very good time. The point is, though, that if so many citizens are supportive of the sound pollution norms, it indicates that they would welcome stringently enforced norms in other spheres of environmental pollution. The WBPCB should not hesitate there either. The big advantage of the sound pollution programme during the festive season is that it is fairly politics-free. There lies the rub. What the WBPCB must do also is to get ahead with similar projects in areas where political and other resistance is inevitable. Its success will ultimately be judged on these counts.