Decide on school closure: Air quality panel to Delhi, NCR as pollution spikes

The Commission on Air Quality Management (CAQM) on Thursday asked Delhi, Haryana, and Uttar Pradesh to take an immediate call on the closure of schools and colleges and allowing half of the employees to work from home as the National Capital Region’s (NCR) air quality deteriorated further, triggering health problems among the vulnerable.

The commission has also put a stop on all linear projects like the construction of highways, roads, flyovers, over-bridges, power transmission lines and pipelines, besides prohibiting entry of trucks and other diesel-run commercial vehicles in Delhi unless they are carrying essential commodities.

Also, private firms are asked to permit 50 per cent of their staff to work from home, while it has been left to the central and state governments to decide on a hybrid working environment.

Read | Air quality panel orders ban on plying of diesel LMVs in Delhi-NCR, entry of trucks into capital

The new set of actions has been taken under the GRAP (Graded Response Action Plan) Stage-4 as Delhi’s air quality index for the first time dropped below 450 on a scale of 500.

According to the Central Pollution Control Board, Delhi’s AQI stood at 450 at 4 pm, whereas all satellite towns, barring Faridabad, stood above 400. This has happened due to a strong upper level (700-1000 m) wind blowing from stubble-burning areas towards Delhi.

Meanwhile, Delhi minister Gopal Rai has called a high-level meeting on Friday to discuss the implementation of curbs under GRAP's final stage.

Stubble emissions with a fire count of 2,994 contribute 34 per cent to PM2.5 in Delhi as per the Ministry of Earth Science's SAFAR (System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting And Research) monitoring network.

The sharp rise in the AQI level in the past few days has resulted in a political slugfest with the Union environment ministry for the second consecutive day blaming Punjab for not doing enough to curb stubble burning, which is considered the main culprit behind the toxic haze that engulfs Delhi at the onset of every winter.

“Punjab refuses to use the bio-decomposer that removes the stubble in 21 days. Haryana used it on 5 lakh acres of land and Uttar Pradesh on 1.4 lakh acres,” Yadav said. “Between Sept 15 and Oct 31, the fire count in Punjab was 16,004 as against 13,269 in 2021. In Haryana, the corresponding numbers are 1,995 and 2,914 respectively.”

The commission also ordered the closing down of all NCR industrial units, which do not run on clean fuel. In the NCR, there are 487 such units in Uttar Pradesh, 270 in Haryana and 103 in Rajasthan.

On Wednesday, Yadav said Punjab saw a 19 per cent plus rise in farm fires over 2021, whereas Haryana witnessed a 30.6 per cent drop. Punjab recorded its highest fire count(3,634) on Wednesday.