MUMBAI: BBC Hindi has won an award at the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union (ABU).

Its radio documentary – Rising Mercury, Deepening Crisis – won the Best Radio Documentary Award at the 44th ABU General Assembly in Tehran, Iran, on 3 November.

It was produced by BBC Hindi Radio editor Shivkant Sharma and presented by Mukesh Sharma. Shivkant Sharma said, "The objective of Rising Mercury, Deepening Crisis was to report how climate change is impacting lives of millions of people in north India, how economic development and changing lifestyle are speeding up climate change and what people could do individually and collectively to tackle climate change.

"We had a very encouraging feedback from our audience, and now the ABU Award proves that we have been quite successful in our mission."

India accounts for just 4.5 per cent of the global emission of green-house gases but the picture is likely to change dramatically within a generation. India's share of global emission is likely to soar as urbanisation accelerates, fuelled by the rapidly growing economy.

In Rising Mercury, Deepening Crisis, BBC Hindi examines the effect of human activity on climate change, and the affect of climate change on the lives of millions of people in India. The documentary takes listeners to places where the impact of climate change is already visible and looks at the evidence on the ground.

Starting in a busy street of Kanpur, one of the most polluted cities of India, the programme moves on to Gangotri, the largest glacier in the Himalayas, and Sunderbans, the largest mangroves in the world, tracing the natural path of the carbon-cycle.

Along with explaining and highlighting the imminent and visible dangers of climate change, the BBC Hindi documentary examines the practical steps that governments and individuals can take to address the issue.