New Delhi: The air quality in the Capital once again dipped to the "poor" category — with the Centre's monitoring agency SAFAR reporting an Air Quality Index for the city at 222 even as the Delhi government and the Centre for AQM upped the ante in the anti-pollution measures they are taking.
SAFAR also predicted that the air quality is set to worsen today.
"Delhi's AQI is in the poor category. Fire count's share in PM2.5 is 12 per cent. Fire emission from upwind region enhances PM2.5 concentration as winds at transport level are from the northwest region.
"Stubble burning share is likely to increase in the next two days if there is no rain. The overall AQI is likely to further degrade to the higher-end of the poor category for the next three days," it said.
According to the data from the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), a total of 969 farm fires were recorded in the six regions with Punjab accounting for 788, Haryana for 155, one in Uttar Pradesh, four in Rajasthan and 21 in Madhya Pradesh. No fire was recorded in Delhi.
Meanwhile, the Centre for Air Quality Management in the NCR on Wednesday said that they are taking stern action against dust polluters — especially construction and demolition sites across the NCR.
In the first half of October, about 112 teams of the CAQM inspected around 1,268 construction and demolition sites across the NCR, of which 313 sites were found violating dust mitigation norms. In addition, the teams also found 60 vehicles flouting norms for the transportation of C&D waste. In total, fines worth Rs 81.2 lakh were imposed on these violators.
CAQM teams have so far imposed fines worth Rs 3.07 crore on about 963 construction sites found violating dust mitigation rules. They have also directed 52 sites to stop all work in light of their polluting activities.