Announcement
Cummins India, in partnership with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and NITI Aayog, announced the launch of an advanced Decision Support System (DSS) for air‑quality management in the twin cities of Pune and Pimpri‑Chinchwad. The system is designed to deliver up to 72‑hour forecasts and actionable, data‑driven insights that enable municipal authorities to anticipate pollution episodes, identify hotspots, investigate emerging events and plan timely interventions.
Decision Support System Details
The DSS was co‑developed with the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC), Pimpri‑Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC) and technology partner Airvoice. It equips city officials with predictive analytics that support hyper‑local, evidence‑based decision‑making, thereby enhancing the capacity of urban governance to improve air quality outcomes.
Impact of the Cleaner Air Better Life (CABL) Initiative
Since its inception, the CABL initiative—an industry‑led programme launched by CII in collaboration with NITI Aayog—has achieved measurable environmental outcomes across rural India. It has reached 100,000 farmers, avoided 640,000 tonnes of crop‑residue burning, conserved 71 billion litres of water, reduced an estimated 130,000 tonnes of CO₂ emissions, and covered 432 villages spanning more than 4.8 lakh acres.
Corporate Background
Cummins Group in India, established in 1962 and headquartered in Pune, operates through 12 legal entities and runs 19 state‑of‑the‑art manufacturing, assembly and distribution facilities. The company serves industrial and automotive sectors with engines, powertrains and related components, maintains over 600 customer touchpoints and employs more than 15,500 people.
Executive Remarks
Shveta Arya, Managing Director of Cummins India Ltd and Chairperson of CII’s Cleaner Air Better Life programme, emphasized that each city’s unique air‑quality challenges require tailored, data‑backed solutions and that expanding the collaborative model from Delhi to Pune creates a replicable blueprint for resilient urban environments. Ashish Aggarwal, Executive Director & Chief Administrative Officer of Cummins India, highlighted the company’s broader sustainability commitment beyond its own operations, noting that the initiative delivers tangible environmental outcomes for the communities it serves. Shikhar Jain, Executive Director – CII – CESD, added that the predictive, data‑driven planning enabled by the DSS will help cities make smarter decisions that improve air quality and public health.
Launch Event
The DSS was unveiled at the Clean Air Forum, attended by senior government officials including Municipal Commissioner Naval Kishore Ram of PMC and District Collector Jitendra Dudi of Pune, as well as representatives from industry, academia, research institutions and civil‑society organisations, underscoring the importance of public‑private collaboration in advancing cleaner‑air solutions.