In a sharp indictment of official inaction on Delhi’s worsening air pollution, the Delhi High Court on Wednesday pulled up the Central government for failing to ensure clean air for citizens and said that, at the very least, authorities must reduce the Goods and Services Tax (GST) on air purifiers, currently pegged at 18 per cent.
A Division Bench of Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Tushar Rao Gedela made it clear that the present situation in the capital region amounted to an emergency and warranted immediate fiscal relief for citizens struggling to protect themselves from toxic air.
“If you cannot provide clean air to people, the minimum you can do is reduce GST on air purifiers,” the Bench told the government counsel, directing the Centre to convene an urgent meeting of the Goods and Services Tax Council (GST Council) should be convened to consider the issue of classifying air-purifiers as 'medical device' and slashing the GST levied on them from 18 to 5 per cent.
“This is the minimum that you can do. Every citizen requires fresh air. If you can’t do it, the minimum you can do is reduce GST. Give an exemption for 15 days on a temporary basis. Treat this situation as an emergency,” the Court observed while slating the hearing for December 26.
"We direct that the said issue of lowering or removing the GST shall be considered by the GST council at the earliest. We are informed that the GST council is a pan-India body, and convening a meeting may take some time. However, considering the air quality situation in Delhi and nearby areas, we find it appropriate for the GST council to meet at the earliest," the order said.
The Court directed the government counsel to seek instruction on how early the GST Council can meet and added, “We may also observe that if the meeting of the council is not possible physically, the same may be considered to be done through video conferencing.”
‘Calculate the harm’
In one of its most pointed remarks, the Bench drew attention to the sheer scale of daily exposure to polluted air.
“How many times do you breathe in a day? 21,000 times. Just calculate the harm you are doing to yourself,” the Court said, underlining the cumulative health damage caused by sustained exposure to hazardous air quality.
The judges added that the matter would be kept listed during the court’s vacation period, but “only for compliance”, signalling that the issue would not be allowed to drift.
PIL on GST and medical devices
The observations came while the High Court was hearing a public interest litigation filed by advocate Kapil Madan, seeking directions to categorise air purifiers as “medical devices” and reduce the GST levied on them from 18 per cent to five per cent.
The petition challenges the classification of air purifiers as non-essential or luxury household appliances, arguing that such a view is divorced from the lived reality of residents in Delhi-NCR, where air quality frequently plunges into the “very poor”, “severe” and “severe+” categories.
As per the plea, the imposition of the highest GST slab on air purifiers during an ongoing air pollution crisis renders them financially inaccessible to large sections of the population and imposes an “arbitrary, unreasonable and constitutionally impermissible burden”.
Medical device under 2020 notification
The basis of the petition is the Centre’s own notification dated February 11, 2020, issued under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940, which significantly expanded the definition of medical devices.
According to the plea, the notification moved away from a narrow, item-specific list and adopted a purpose-based classification, bringing under regulatory oversight any instrument, apparatus or appliance intended for the prevention, diagnosis, monitoring or alleviation of disease, even if it functions through mechanical or non-pharmacological means.
“Air purifiers perform a critical medical-device function by enabling safe respiration and mitigating life-threatening exposures, placing them squarely within the preventive and physiological-support purposes,” the petition states.
Devices equipped with High-Efficiency Particulate Air (HEPA) filters, the plea argues, demonstrably remove fine particulate matter, allergens and toxic airborne pollutants, reducing exposure to PM2.5 and PM10 particles known to cause asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and cardiovascular illnesses. Many air purifiers also include sensors that monitor air quality, enabling early detection of hazardous conditions.
Arbitrary fiscal classification
The petition strongly criticises the differential tax treatment accorded to air purifiers vis-à-vis other medical devices, most of which attract a concessional GST rate of five per cent.
“Continued imposition of 18 per cent GST on air purifiers, despite their medically recognised role in crisis situations and their functional equivalence to devices taxed at 5 per cent, constitutes an arbitrary and unreasonable fiscal classification,” the plea states.
Such differential treatment, it argues, fails the constitutional test of intelligible differentia under Article 14 and bears no rational nexus to public health objectives, thereby warranting judicial intervention.
Article 21 and the right to breathe
Framing the issue as one of fundamental rights, the petitioner contends that sustained exposure to toxic air amounts to a direct assault on the right to life under Article 21 of the Constitution.
Citing advisories issued by the World Health Organization (WHO-SEARO) and the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare under the National Programme on Climate Change and Human Health, the plea notes that air purifiers are officially recognised as necessary protective devices during poor to severe air quality conditions, particularly for vulnerable populations such as children, the elderly and those with pre-existing respiratory or cardiac conditions.
“The imposition of GST at the highest slab upon air purifiers, a device that has become indispensable for securing minimally safe indoor air, denies effective access to a life-protective device,” the petition argues.
With the High Court now pressing the Centre for immediate instructions and hinting at temporary exemptions, the case has placed the spotlight squarely on whether fiscal policy can remain indifferent in the face of a public health emergency where, as the Court put it, citizens inhale polluted air nearly 21,000 times a day.