The Government of India and the Government of Haryana signed a $300 million loan agreement with the World Bank on March 13, 2026, to finance the Haryana Clean Air Project for Sustainable Development Operation, a multi-sectoral environmental initiative targeting one of the world’s most severely polluted atmospheric regions, according to the World Bank’s official project documentation and reporting by the Economic Times and AsiaOne.
The agreement was signed by Juhi Mukherjee, Joint Secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs, Dr. J. Ganesan, Chief Executive Officer of the ARJUN Council, and Paul Procee, Acting Country Director for the World Bank in India, according to the World Bank documentation. The loan carries a maturity of 23.5 years with a six-year grace period, reflecting the long-term nature of the environmental outcomes being pursued.
The Airshed Framework
The project departs from traditional pollution management — which typically operates within state administrative boundaries — in favour of what the World Bank describes as an “airshed-based” approach. This recognises that air pollution across the Indo-Gangetic Plains and Himalayan Foothills region moves across state and national boundaries, and that effective intervention requires coordinated management at the regional level. The project integrates Haryana’s interventions within the broader Regional Air Quality Management Program covering this region, according to World Bank project materials.
The project’s stated beneficiary population is approximately 270 million people within the regional airshed, according to the same documentation. Key operational focus areas within Haryana include the industrial and urban centres of Gurugram, Faridabad, and Sonipat. Sectoral targets include the transition of 2,000 micro, small, and medium enterprises to cleaner production technologies, agricultural interventions addressing stubble burning and fertiliser efficiency, and transport electrification.
Private Capital and Gender Inclusion
Beyond the $300 million World Bank loan, the project aims to mobilise $127 million in private capital from the energy, transport, and industrial sectors, according to World Bank documentation. This target represents an aspiration within the project’s design framework; the mechanisms for achieving it include the ARJUN Council’s role as a Special Purpose Vehicle to coordinate investment and monitoring.
A gender inclusion component — the Women in Transit initiative — commits to integrating 10,000 women into the electric bus workforce in Gurugram and Faridabad. This component is supported by grants from the World Bank’s Resilient Asia Program, according to the research documents.
