Delhi records worst air quality of year after Diwali due to rampant bursting of crackers: Officials
New Delhi, Nov 8: Delhi recorded its worst air quality of the year the morning after Diwali as the pollution level entered "severe-plus emergency" category due to rampant bursting of toxic firecrackers, authorities said on Thursday.
In a gross violation of a Supreme Court order, people in several cities burst firecrackers until at least midnight, two hours after the 10 PM deadline. Loud bangs rent the air in New Delhi. Violations were also recorded in Mumbai, Kolkata, Jaipur and other major cities.
Partly as a result of smoke from the firecrackers, the overall air quality index in Delhi jumped to 574 which falls in the "severe-plus emergency" category, according to data by the Centre-run SAFAR (System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting And Research).
The sharp spike in pollution is caused by rampant burning of firecrackers that has led to the formation of a smoky layer across the national capital and drastically reduced visibility, the authorities said.
The SAFAR had warned that even if partial toxic firecrackers as compare to last year were burnt, then the air quality would fall in the severe category.
An AQI between 0 and 50 is considered "good", 51 and 100 "satisfactory", 101 and 200 "moderate", 201 and 300 "poor", 301 and 400 "very poor", and 401 and 500 "severe". Above 500 is "severe-plus emergency" category.
The Delhi Air Quality Index is around 574 at present. Air Quality Index entered in severe category at 2 AM after midnight on Thursday and will continue to remain in severe category until evening, a senior official said.
A 'severe plus emergency' air quality index (AQI) essentially means that even healthy people may suffer from respiratory illnesses on a prolonged exposure to such air. This air will seriously affect those with ailments, according to the advisory issued by SAFAR.
The Supreme Court has allowed people to burst firecrackers from 8 PM to 10 PM only on Diwali and other festivals. The Supreme Court also allowed manufacture and sale of just "green crackers" which have low emission of light, sound and harmful chemicals.
The court said the police should ensure that there is no sale of banned firecrackers and in case of any violation, the Station House Officer (SHO) of the police station of the area would be held personally liable and this would amount to committing contempt of the court.
But despite the Supreme Court's order, certain places recorded violations where firecrackers were burnt before and after the set timeframe.
The areas where the violations were recorded included Mayur Vihar Extension, Lajpat Nagar, Lutyens' Delhi, IP extension, Dwarka and Noida Sector 78.
The police admitted that violations have been observed and it would take serious legal action against the people violating the Supreme Court order. They said they were continuously patrolling the areas to check for violations.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Haryana land deal: Robert Vadra appears before ED on 3rd day
_vb_32.jpeg)
New Delhi (PTI): Robert Vadra, the businessman brother-in-law of Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, appeared before the ED on the third straight day on Thursday for questioning in a money laundering case linked to alleged irregularities in a 2008 Haryana land deal case.
The 56-year-old has been questioned for over ten hours in the last two days as part of the investigation and the recording of his statement process under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) will continue Thursday, officials said.
He reached the ED office in central Delhi shortly after 11 am accompanied by his wife Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, who is MP from Wayanad.
Vadra had called the ED action borne out of "political vendetta" against him and his family, and said that while he has always cooperated with the agency and furnished thousands of pages of documents, he needed a "closure" in these cases which are almost 20 years old.
The probe against Vadra is linked to a land deal in Haryana's Manesar-Shikohpur (now sector 83) in Gurugram.
The deal of February 2008 was done by a company named Skylight Hospitality Pvt Ltd, where Vadra was a director earlier, as it purchased a 3.5 acre of land in Shikohpur from Onkareshwar Properties at a price of Rs 7.5 crore.
A Congress government led by Bhupinder Singh Hooda was in power at that time. Four years later, in September 2012, the company sold the land to realty major DLF for Rs 58 crore.
The land deal got embroiled in controversy in October 2012 after IAS officer Ashok Khemka, then posted as the director general of Land Consolidation and Land Records-cum-Inspector-General of Registration of Haryana, cancelled the mutation of this categorising the transaction as violative of state consolidation Act and some related procedures.
The BJP, which was in opposition then, had termed the case an instance of "corruption" in land deals and that of "nepotism", hinting at Vadra's kinship with the first family of the Congress party.
Haryana Police had filed an FIR to probe this deal in 2018.
Vadra has been questioned multiple times by the federal probe agency in two different money laundering cases earlier.
Sources told PTI that the ED will soon file chargesheets in all these three cases being investigated against Vadra.
