🔗 Share this article

On Tuesday morning citizens of the world's most polluted city were faced with exposed to extremely polluted air that registered in the "critical" level.

Extremely High Air Quality Levels

Several parts of the city registered an pollution measurement over 500, which translates to 10x the healthy threshold set by the World Health Organization.

Certain monitoring stations, levels of PM2.5 and PM10 hit highs of 1,800, representing 15-20x higher than acceptable limits.

Pyrotechnics Prohibition and New Policy Shifts

For the past four years, authorities had maintained a comprehensive restriction on the distribution and bursting of pyrotechnics during celebrations due to their significant contribution to the hazardous haze that engulfs the capital as colder weather approaches.

Yet earlier this year, the recently formed regional leadership approached the supreme court to request a modification of the restrictions.

They proposed allowing "eco-friendly fireworks" – historically doubted by environmentalists as being only roughly 30 percent less polluting – as a balance between "heritage and environment".

Court Decision and Enforcement

Despite concerns of public health and environmental activists, judicial authorities agreed to the request, specifying that environmentally conscious fireworks could be set off during specific hours throughout the celebrations.

Throughout the festival evening, there was widespread flouting of the regulated periods across the metropolis, with insufficient monitoring regarding whether the firecrackers being used were actually the supposedly greener type.

Many recording stations throughout Delhi showed air quality peaking around the night hours to some of the worst levels recorded during celebrations in at least recent memory.

Regional Effects

The widespread use of firecrackers during the festival also initiated a blame game with neighbouring Pakistan, with representatives in Pakistan's the Punjab region partly blaming declining atmospheric conditions in their urban centers on hazardous particles originating in across the border following the events.

Long-Standing Pollution Issue

The dangerously high readings of pollution in the capital have persisted as a major challenge for over a decade and a half, with the situation continuing to worsen.

Around celebratory seasons, the concentration of hazardous particulate matter in the atmosphere has been documented to spike to 70% higher the worst records ever documented in Beijing, which was once considered as the world's most polluted urban center.

Multiple Contamination Factors

This crisis in Delhi is attributed to a combination of multiple factors including transportation pollution, construction debris, building projects, rubbish burning and pollutants from crop residue ignition in neighbouring states of farming communities.

Within these states, farmers regularly ignite agricultural waste to clear them quickly, generating hazardous haze that then gets trapped over the capital as winter air descends.

Public Health and Financial Impact

Both financial and medical impact on the nearly 33 million people calling home the capital region is significant, according to multiple investigations.

This pollution causes increased incidence of nervous system, heart and circulatory and breathing diseases, and can potentially cause cancer.

Air quality crisis is estimated to be responsible for 10,000 untimely fatalities per year in Delhi.