Can you blame Deepawali? Why are Lahore and Karachi on the ‘most polluted’ list?

What happens to the unbridled campaign against Deepawali festive spirit vis-à-vis Delhi’s air pollution?

If Lahore in Pakistan is the most polluted city globally and the issue is widely reported, and there is veiled admission by big guns in Pakistan, why year after year, the Hindu festival and firecrackers are blamed and also ‘banned’?

According to reports, “Lahore has been declared the most polluted city in the world, leaving the Indian capital of New Delhi far behind, after its air quality index (AQI) went above 400.” Another Pakistani ‘congested city’ Karachi, came in fourth.

In recent years, air pollution has worsened in Pakistan as a mixture of low-grade diesel fumes, smoke from seasonal crop burn off, and colder winter temperatures coalesce into stagnant clouds of smog.

The ‘motivated’ campaigners and anti firecrackers lobby would be either silent now or doing more research!

Well, a report in Aljazeera.com says: “Air quality in Lahore usually worsens during the winter season from October to February when farmers in the wider Punjab set light to the remnants of crops, producing smoke that adds to smog”.

According to reports in a section of Pakistani media, one Justice had earlier observed that the ‘provincial government of Punjab’ was allegedly responsible for making Lahore the most polluted city.

In the last week of November 2020, Pakistani city, Lahore, had topped the list of the world’s most polluted cities as it had recorded a particulate matter (PM) rating of 423.

Pakistan’s financial capital, Karachi, was ranked at seven on the AQI last year, and New Delhi came in second. Nepal’s capital Kathmandu was ranked the third-worst city with a PM of 178 in 2020.

Thus, the issues are more fundamental for ‘air pollution’ in the entire region, and scientists still have to find conclusive and convincing reasons for these.

As reported earlier, studies have revealed that Delhi, in past years, has had 854 (326 +340+188) unhealthy to hazardous days in five years till September 2021. Sadly, however, everyone from the public and media and other stakeholders focuses only on 10 out of 1255 days–that too, without much success.