The air quality index in Delhi on Wednesday dropped to 424 from 488 at 9 am the previous day, but the air remained hazardous. On Monday, Delhi recorded its second-worst air quality since 2015 and the air quality index at the same time was recorded at 484. The government implemented Stage IV of the Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) the same day.
Amid a blame game between the ruling AAP and BJP, Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai urged the Centre to convene an emergency meeting to deal with the situation and approve inducing artificial rain over the national capital. According to the Central Pollution Control Board, Monday’s reading was the second-worst air quality recorded since AQI tracking began in 2015.
An AQI between 0 and 50 is considered ‘good,’ 51-100 ‘satisfactory,’ 101-200 ‘moderate,’ 201-300 ‘poor,’ 301-400 ‘very poor,’ 401-450 ‘severe,’ and above 450 ‘severe plus.’ At 4 pm on Tuesday, CPCB data recorded PM2.5 level at 307, which was the prominent pollutant. The PM2.5 particles with have a diameter of 2.5 micrometers or less, roughly the width of a human hair.
The Delhi Health Department also asked the hospitals to monitor and report daily cases of respiratory ailments, including both outpatient (OPD) and inpatient (IPD) cases, and to promptly flag any unusual increase in the number of cases, it said.
According to the Centre’s Decision Support System (DSS) for Air Quality Management, vehicular emissions contributed an estimated 16 per cent to Delhi’s pollution on Tuesday. Data on contribution by stubble burning was not provided for the second consecutive day.