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On Tuesday morning residents of the world's most polluted city found themselves exposed to severely hazardous air that registered in the "alarming" level.

Record-Breaking Air Quality Levels

Multiple areas of the city recorded an pollution measurement over 500, which equals ten times the safe level recommended by the WHO.

Certain monitoring stations, concentrations of PM2.5 and PM10 hit highs of eighteen hundred, amounting to 15 to 20 times higher than healthy limits.

Pyrotechnics Ban and Recent Developments

Beginning in 2020, authorities had maintained a total prohibition on the distribution and bursting of firecrackers during the Festival of Lights due to their major role to the hazardous smog that engulfs the metropolis as colder weather approaches.

Nevertheless in recent months, the newly elected local administration approached the judicial authority to propose a relaxation of the ban.

The suggestion was allowing "green crackers" – previously questioned by environmental experts as being only roughly 30 percent reduced emissions – as a compromise between "heritage and environment".

Judicial Decision and Implementation

Despite concerns of public health and environmental campaigners, the court agreed to the proposal, mandating that green firecrackers could be used during specific hours throughout the Diwali.

During the celebrations, there was widespread flouting of the regulated periods across the city, with little enforcement regarding whether the firecrackers being used were actually the eco-friendly variety.

Numerous monitoring devices throughout the capital registered contamination peaking around the night hours to extremely hazardous levels recorded during Diwali in at least the past three years.

Regional Consequences

Extensive ignition of firecrackers during the festival also initiated a blame game with neighbouring Pakistan, with authorities in Pakistan's Punjab partly blaming worsening air quality in the city of Lahore on contaminants traveling from neighboring India following the events.

Chronic Environmental Problem

Alarmingly severe levels of pollution in the city have remained as a significant challenge for fifteen-plus years, with the problem showing no improvement.

Near Diwali, the amount of dangerous particles in the environment has been found to spike to seventy percent above the peak levels ever measured in China's capital, which was formerly regarded as the globally most contaminated urban center.

Multiple Pollution Sources

The problem in the capital is resulting from a convergence of various sources including automobile exhaust, dust, development work, garbage fires and haze from farm burning in nearby states of farming communities.

Throughout these areas, farmers regularly ignite agricultural waste to expedite field preparation, generating dangerous pollution that remains stagnant over the metropolitan area as cooler air arrives.

Health and Economic Toll

The economic and health toll on the nearly 33 million people residing in the metropolitan zone is substantial, according to numerous research.

The contaminated air results in high levels of nervous system, heart and circulatory and respiratory diseases, and can result in malignancies.

Air quality crisis is calculated to be causing approximately 10k early mortalities each year in the capital.