Delhi air quality worsens to very poor category during Diwali
The national capital's average Air Quality Index reached 376 on Sunday as pollution levels deteriorated during festival celebrations.
Delhi's air quality deteriorated on Sunday, November 8, as residents celebrated Diwali, according to reports by WION and Scroll. The city's average Air Quality Index (AQI) for the day settled at 376, placing it in the very poor category, up from 369 on Saturday.
At 7 pm on Sunday, the instantaneous AQI stood at 371. Of the 59 monitoring stations recording data at that time, 19 were in the severe category, seven were in the poor category, and 33 were in the very poor category. Jahangirpuri recorded the highest AQI at 460, according to WION, while Scroll reported a reading of 417 at the same location as of 7.05 am on Monday.
To combat winter pollution, the Delhi government implemented Stage 3 of the Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) in the Delhi-NCR region on Friday, November 6. Under these rules, all non-essential construction and demolition activities are banned, and the movement of BS-3 petrol and BS-4 diesel four-wheelers is prohibited. Additionally, government offices in the region have been instructed to operate with only half of their workforce on-site, while the other half works from home.
Pollution levels in the surrounding areas also remained high. Noida recorded a very poor AQI of 308, while Ghaziabad and Greater Noida were in the poor category. In Haryana, Gurugram recorded an average AQI of 225, and Faridabad recorded 118, which is classified as moderate.