The Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1981 (Act No. 14 of 1981) is an Act of the Parliament of India that serves as the primary legislative framework for the prevention, control, and abatement of air pollution. It was enacted on March 29, 1981, as India’s first dedicated law to combat air pollution. The Act's origin lies in the need to implement the decisions taken at the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment held in Stockholm in June 1972, which urged member nations to preserve natural resources like air.
The Act works by establishing a two-tier institutional structure: the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) and the State Pollution Control Boards (SPCBs), which are tasked with implementing and enforcing its provisions. This structure is connected to the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1974, as the Boards established under the Water Act were also designated to perform functions under the Air Act. A key mechanism is the "consent" regime under Section 21, which mandates that no person can establish or operate an industrial plant in an air pollution control area without the State Board's permission. State Governments are empowered under Section 19 to declare any area as an "air pollution control area".
The Act has undergone significant changes, notably an amendment in 1987 (Act No. 47 of 1987) that expanded the definition of 'air pollutant' in Section 2(a) to explicitly include 'noise'. More recently, the Jan Vishwas (Amendment of Provisions) Act, 2023, substituted Sections 37 to 41 and largely decriminalized many violations by replacing imprisonment with monetary penalties ranging from ten thousand rupees to fifteen lakh rupees. The 2023 amendment also introduced a provision in Section 21(1) allowing the Central Government to exempt certain industrial plant categories from the mandatory consent requirement.