Air quality dips to ‘very poor’ in Delhi as stubble burning continues

New Delhi, Oct 14: A thick layer of haze lingered over the national capital, New Delhi on Monday morning as its air quality index deteriorated further touching the 239-mark, which falls in the poor category.

According to Central Pollution Control data, the air quality index of the adjoining areas of Ghaziabad, Faridabad, Noida and others have also shown a deteriorating air quality while most of them fall under poor category.

Air quality index deteriorates further in Delhi

On Monday morning, the AQI of Delhi-NCR areas such as Rohini (207), Dwarka (194), Pusa Road (182), Mandir Marg (179), Noida Sector 62 (217), Noida Sector 125 (202), Ghaziabad (252), Anand Vihar (218) and Patparganj (189) wavered between ‘poor' to ‘moderate'.

According to data provided by aqicn.org, the pollution level in the city has plunged with the Air Quality Index (AQI) oscillating between 'moderate' to ‘poor' category.

An AQI between 0-50 is considered good, 51-100 is satisfactory, 101-200 moderate, 201-300 poor, 301-400 very poor and 401-500 is marked as severe/hazardous

Arvind Kejriwal blames stubble burning in other states:

Perturbed by the situation, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal tweeted, "All the gains achieved so far on pollution front will be nullified. Whereas, we need to do a lot in Delhi and we are trying, however, all governments and all agencies need to work to stop crop burning also (sic)."On Saturday, he had said smoke from crop residue burning in neighbouring states has started reaching Delhi and the air quality has started deteriorating. "It has been widely reported that the smoke coming to Delhi is due to the burning of stubble in Karnal, Haryana," he had said.

The Centre-run System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research said smoke from stubble burning will make up six per cent of Delhi's pollution by October 15, when GRAP comes into force in the Delhi-NCR region. Prepared by Central Pollution Control Board, GRAP lists various measures to be taken according to severity of pollution.

The 10-member task force on the GRAP had on Friday held a meeting on the stubble burning incidents reported from Punjab and Haryana, and its likely impact on Delhi-NCR's air quality.

V K Soni, a senior scientist at the India Meteorological Department, who attended the meeting, said winds are calm due to monsoon withdrawal, leading to low dispersion of pollutants. Also, wind direction has changed to west and north-west, he said.

Stubble burning continues in Haryana despite ban:

Though Haryana has reported a slight decrease in the number of stubble burning incidents, Punjab has reported a massive increase of 45 per cent in such cases till October 11, according to data of pollution control boards of the two states.

Despite a ban on stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana, farmers continue to defy it amid a lack of financial incentives.

State governments are providing 50 to 80 per cent subsidy to farmers and cooperative societies to buy modern farm equipment for in-situ management of paddy straw and running a massive awareness campaign against stubble burning.

Anti-pollution measures to kick in:

Starting October 15, stricter measures to fight air pollution will come into force in Delhi and its neighbourhood as part of GRAP, which was first implemented in Delhi-NCR in 2017.

These measures include increasing bus and metro services, hiking parking fees and stopping use of diesel generator sets when the air quality turns poor.

When the situation turns "severe", GRAP recommends closure of brick kilns, stone crushers and hot mix plants, sprinkling of water, frequent mechanised cleaning of roads and maximising power generation from natural gas.

The measures to be followed in the "emergency" situation include stopping entry of trucks into Delhi, ban on construction activities and introduction of the odd-even car rationing scheme.

(with PTI inputs)