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As Tuesday dawned citizens of the world's most polluted city were faced with inhaling extremely polluted air that registered in the "alarming" range.

Extremely High Air Quality Measurements

Several parts of the city registered an air quality index exceeding 500, which translates to 10x the healthy level established by the global health authority.

In some locations, readings of dangerous airborne particles reached peaks of 1,800, amounting to fifteen to twenty times higher than healthy standards.

Fireworks Prohibition and Recent Policy Shifts

For the past four years, the government had enforced a complete ban on the purchase and ignition of firecrackers during Diwali due to their major role to the dangerous smog that engulfs the city as the cold season sets in.

Yet earlier this year, the current local government petitioned the supreme court to seek a easing of the restrictions.

They proposed allowing "green crackers" – which have been doubted by environmentalists as being only about 30% less polluting – as a middle ground between "heritage and ecological concerns".

Court Decision and Reality

Much to the frustration of environmental and health advocates, the court complied with the appeal, specifying that green firecrackers could be ignited during limited hours throughout the celebrations.

Throughout the festival evening, there was widespread flouting of the designated hours across the capital, with little enforcement regarding whether the pyrotechnics being used were actually the eco-friendly variety.

Several monitoring devices throughout the city recorded contamination reaching highest levels around late evening to the most severe measurements seen during celebrations in at least recent memory.

Regional Implications

The proliferation of fireworks during Diwali also triggered a blame game with adjacent the neighboring country, with representatives in Pakistan's the Punjab region partly blaming deteriorating pollution levels in their urban centers on hazardous particles traveling from India following the events.

Persistent Environmental Problem

The dangerously high concentrations of pollution in the capital have continued as a major problem for over a decade and a half, with the condition showing no improvement.

During the festival period, the concentration of hazardous airborne contaminants in the environment has been documented to shoot up to seventy percent above the most severe records ever recorded in Beijing, which was previously regarded as the planet's dirtiest metropolis.

Various Pollution Contributors

The situation in the capital is attributed to a mix of multiple factors including transportation pollution, construction debris, construction activities, garbage fires and smoke from agricultural fires in neighbouring states of neighboring agricultural zones.

Within these states, agricultural workers routinely ignite agricultural waste to clear them quickly, generating hazardous pollution that becomes contained over the city as colder air arrives.

Medical and Financial Impact

The economic and health consequences on the nearly 33 million people living in the Delhi area is enormous, according to numerous investigations.

These hazardous conditions leads to high levels of neurological, heart and circulatory and lung diseases, and can potentially cause cancer.

Environmental contamination is estimated to be accounting for approximately 10k premature mortalities annually in Delhi.