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In terms of reducibility, noise pollution comes first followed by air, surface and water pollution-- in that order. This means all types of pollution are containable (being mostly man-made and largely due to agency failure), only that high decibel sound is more easily curbed than the remainder of the environmental hazards(better call them menaces)!
The ease with sound pollution lies in lowering the volume of noises. No physical cleansing operation is required to be undertaken as in the case of other forms of contamination . There is, however, a small habit-forming problem -- as the decibel increases our auditory nerves get used to the higher level of sound. And we wouldn't know about its dangerous flight before the damage is done.
So, rather than boasting of our strong auditory nerves, we should be ashamed of it. That we have allowed the noise levels in the capital city to cross the critical threshold by one and a half to two times is a ringing indictment on our failure to address an approaching existential disaster .This is being renamed "noise terrorism", one that menaces the future of our progeny by stunting as you might imagine.
Thus, we saw on April 25 the observance of the International Noise Awareness Day themed "Let noise pollution be curbed for the proper growth of your child." The US-based Center for Hearing and Communication has been undertaking a global awareness-building programme since 1996 on high decibel sound. As part of the global initiative, a children's rally was held on April 25 at Satmasjid Road in Dhanmondi by 11 institutions, including Bangladesh Paribesh Andolon(BAPA), Stamford University Bangladesh, Work for Better Bangladesh (WBB) Trust.
With the children holding a placard reading "stop noise", the rally had a hugely important demonstrative dimension to it: A Sound Pressure Level (SPL) Meter measured noise intensity with the peak at 112 and the lowest at 82 decibel points right before the eyes of the children . In a relatively quiet place like Dhanmondi it should have been 50 decibel.
Whereas, according to standard environmental stipulations, permissible sound levels between day and night times are 40 and 70 decibel respectively; yet, at the following five places the levels recorded by WBB Trust early in the current year exceeded by 150 -200 per cent: Farmgate 129.8 in the morning and 132.8 in the evening; Hazaribagh 129.6 and 132.8; Paltan intersection 111.6 and 125.7; Shahbagh 113.2 and 126.7; Shahjahanpur 127.8 and 109.3 respectively. In mixed areas, the tolerable noise level was 50-60 decibels.
One couldn't agree more with the views of the president of the function, architect Iqbal Habib. Said he, 'Environment directorate was making law, amending and honing it; but at the field level when it came to getting a move against law breakers, nothing seemed to happen. The expert added an insightful remark: 'The law enforcing agency seemingly think giving security is their only responsibility; but here you have "noise terrorism" against which they are not seen taking a pro-active role.'
A raft of recommendations were issued from the rally. They include forbidding use of mike at meetings, rallies, social gatherings without permission; setting sound standards for operating generators and other machines; implementing noise pollution rules, classification of areas as 'quiet, residential, commercial, mixed and industrial' and labelling them as such according to rules. Loud hooting should be punished with driving licenses issued to tested, environment-literate applicants.
I have just three points to round up with: One, sustained hammering on the issue instead of one-off tokenism to stir up action on the ground ; two, realising it as a continuing bane of unplanned and self-serving urbanisation and taking corrective measures; last but not least, treat the matter from civic, cultural and life-style (hiatus) points of view if we mean to effect a real turn-around in the situation.