The Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1981 was enacted in an effort to put into effect decisions concluded at the United Nations Conference on Human Environment held in Stockholm in 1972. The preamble of the act explicitly states the objective of the Act as- “to provide for the prevention, control and abatement of air pollution, for the establishment, with a view to carrying out the aforesaid purposes, of Boards, for conferring on and assigning to such Boards powers and functions relating thereto and for matters connecting therewith”. The act sets up state and central pollution boards for the purpose of meeting the prescribed ends. The paper deals with various sections in the act, explores them in depth, and at the same time, analyses it critically; it evaluates the act after explaining it in detail. The paper picks up important individual sections of the act and explains the dimensions of each of those, often through diagrams and tables as well. The paper critiques the act from various perspectives and argues that the Act is in severe need of amendment in some key areas, such as that of recruitment of personnel. It is evaluates key sections of the act and seeks to dissect and examine them in isolation of each other, as well as seeing them together in a whole picture. The bare act was of central importance to the author as she attempts to evaluate the kind of legislative effort and foresight that went, and
should have gone, into the making of this particular act.

Keywords: Air Act (1981), Critique, Explanation, Bare Act, Need for Amendment.