Miss Alone
Prime VIP
All schools in Delhi would remain closed for three days and road-rationing could be brought back, Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal said on Sunday, announcing a list of emergency measures as the city continued to battle smog.
Kejriwal called an emergency meeting of his cabinet on Sunday to tackle the spike in air pollution since Diwali last week. “We never anticipated air pollution would reach such alarming levels. We are not solely blaming crop burning,” said the chief minister.
Kejriwal had on Saturday described the city as a gas chamber and pointed finger at burning of farm residue in Punjab and Haryana for the worst smog to hit Delhi in almost two decades.
The chief minister announced a five-day ban on all construction and demolition in the city. Dust arising out of these activities is one of the big reasons for the rise in PM 2.5 levels.
The coal-fired Badarpur plant will be shut down for 10 days and fly ash will not be transported out of the plant. The fly ash lying at the site would be sprinkled with water so it doesn’t disperse in the air.
Water sprinkling of the roads will begin Monday and vacuum cleaning from November 10. Diesel generators also face a 10-day ban.
Kejriwal said the government was preparing for another round of odd-even plan, an emergency measure first implemented in the city in January that limited the use of private cars.
Those with odd-numbered plates could be driven on odd dates and those with an even number as the last digit on even days.
Hindustan Times’ air quality index showed that the pollution showed no signs of abating on Sunday. Most places in south, central and north Delhi recorded “severe” air quality with PM 2.5 levels between 12 and 15 times the safe limit. Sirifort in south Delhi and Anand Vihar in east Delhi were among the most polluted.
