Delhi’s air worsens, blame game erupts
AQI for 24 hours till 4pm on Thursday was at 312, as per government data, a level not seen since February
NEW DELHI: Top ministers of the Union and the Delhi governments traded blame on Thursday as the city’s air quality slipped into the “very poor” category, a stark replay of how the crisis has unfolded in recent years when close to 30 million people are exposed to hazardous levels of pollution in the run-up to the winter.
Delhi’s average air quality index (AQI) for the 24 hours till 4pm on Thursday was at 312, according to government data, a level not seen since February. Air quality was similar in Gurugram (311), and slightly worse in Noida (321) and Ghaziabad (322).
One of two monitoring stations in Greater Noida recorded an AQI of 400, which is on the cusp of the “severe” category – the highest of the five-point scale for air pollution.
Thursday’s spat, which later also included comments from Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh, began with Union minister of environment, forest and climate change, Prakash Javadekar, saying that only 4%
of Delhi’s air pollution is due to farm fires in the neighbouring states of Punjab and Haryana.
“Stubble burning is contributing to only 4% load now, 96% of the load (pollution load of Delhi) is from local factors such as biomass burning, unpaved roads, dust, construction and demolition waste. CPCB teams will monitor these local factors and submit reports to concerned authorities immediately,” he said.
The stand, however, was criticised by Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal. “Staying in denial will not help. If stubble burning causes only 4% pollution, why has pollution suddenly
increased over the last fortnight? Air was clean before that. It’s the same story every year. There’s no massive jump in any local source of pollution in Delhi in last few days to cause this spike,” Kejriwal said.
The chief minister added: “Let’s accept that stubble burning causes huge pollution every year in north India during this time. And let’s all get together to find a solution sincerely. Blame game and politics hasn’t helped anyone. People are suffering. I’m extremely worried that pollution will play havoc coupled with Covid-19.”
Javadekar responded to these with tweets of his own: “My statement today on air pollution in Delhi has been misinterpreted by a section of the media. Let me clarify, the figures of 4% share of stubble burning in AQI in Delhi pertained to this week. It varies from 4 to 40% during peak stubble burning.”
The environment ministry, too, tweeted out the clarification.
“At the same time let us not be in denial that there are several local factors -- vehicular pollution, non-agricultural biomass burning, dust, geographical and meteorological -- that are primarily responsible for high air pollution during winters in Delhi,” Union minister Prakash Javadekar said later.