Speaking to Newsline on Thursday, Jairam Ramesh, Minister for Environment and Forests, reiterated the stand he made in Parliament yesterday — that plastic bags should not be banned. “There shouldn’t be a blanket ban on plastic bags. Can you imagine eating chips out of a jute bag?” he said.

“Biodegradable plastic bags are a good option but they are too expensive. We will consider giving subsidies to manufacturers of such bags,” he said.

Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, however, said Delhi has no plans of giving subsidies to manufacturers of biodegradable bags as of now. Softening the Delhi government’s stand on a comprehensive ban on plastic bags, she told Newsline: “We don’t have a blanket ban on plastic bags. We are going ahead with the ban in a very careful way. We can still use biodegradable plastic bags in the city.”

However, in publicity campaigns the Delhi government has called for the use of paper and jute bags, not biodegradable plastic bags. As per the Delhi government notification on plastic bags, all forms of plastic bags, including biodegradable bags, are banned from local shopping centres and the main markets in Delhi. Therefore, biodegradable plastic bags are allowed only in the city’s smallest markets, which fall outside the ambit of surprise checks.

The chief minister also indicated that it is difficult to find the ‘one’ solution to plastic bags. “I know just jute bags or recycled paper bags or cloth bags aren’t in themselves a total substitute for plastic bags. But we want people to use a mix of eco-friendly alternatives,” she said.

While the Delhi government has organised a lot of awareness campaigns against plastic bags, enforcement on the ground has been practically nonexistent. In the first few months of the ban shopkeepers shifted to other alternatives but now, most have switched back to plastic bags. In a meeting in May, Dikshit had instructed seven teams to intensify the enforcement of the plastic ban.