Delhi pollution: Living in Indian capital is like watching a dystopian film again and again

Vocabulary: 401, Words: 845

1Winter has come to Delhi and with it, a familiar sense of gloom. 2The sky here is grey and there is a thick, visible blanket of smog.

3If you stay outdoors for more than a few minutes, you can almost taste ash. 4You will feel breathless within minutes if you try to run or even walk at a brisk pace in the smog.

5Newspapers are back to using words like toxic, deadly and poisonous in their main headlines.

6Most schools have been shut and people have been advised to stay indoors - though those whose livelihoods depend on working outdoors can’t afford to do so.

7Delhi’s air quality score was somewhere between 1,200 and 1,500 on Monday and Tuesday, according to different monitoring agencies. 8The acceptable limit is less than 100.

9These scores measure the levels of particulate matter - called PM 2.5 and PM10 - in the air. 10These tiny particles can enter the lungs and cause a host of diseases.

11On social media, people have been expressing shock, disappointment and anguish that it’s all happening again.

12Along with the gloom, there is a strong sense of déjà vu - like we have seen this all many times before in the past 15 years.

13I recorded this video of my drive to office in 2017, when smog had reduced visibility to less than 2m.

14On Tuesday, my drive to work seemed even worse.

15And we have covered every twist and turn of this story in the past two decades.

16We have reported on how pollution is making people sick and reducing their life expectancy here, here and here, and how it affects children here, here and here. 17The crisis affects the poor the most but they mostly don’t have a choice but to go out and work in the smog, as we have covered here, here and here.

18Every year, politicians blame each other, as we have reported here, here and here.

19We have discussed the root cause of the problem here, here and here, and the solutions - both the ones that marginally worked and the ones that failed miserably - here, here and here.

20Covering this story feels like watching (and being in) the same dystopian film every year - following the same characters, plot and script. 21The outcome is always the same - nothing changes.

22The parks are empty again - people, particularly children and the elderly, have been told to stay indoors.

23Those who must work - daily-wage labourers, rickshaw pullers, delivery riders - are coughing but still going out.

24Hospitals are seeing an increasing number of people coming in with respiratory problems.

25And amid all this, we are back to the same question again - why does nothing change?

26The simple answer is that solving Delhi's air problem requires monumental efforts and coordination.

27The sources of the problem are many. 28One of them is the practice of farmers burning crop remains to clear their fields quickly to sow seeds for the next yield.

29This mostly happens in the neighbouring states of Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh. 30The smoke from the farm fires engulfs Delhi every winter and hangs low in the atmosphere as wind speeds reduce during winter months.

31But farmers can’t be entirely blamed for this because this is the cheapest way of clearing fields.

32Different governments have talked about providing machines and financial incentives to stop crop burning, but very little has happened on the ground.

33Delhi itself produces a huge chunk of the pollution - emission from vehicles, construction and factories.

34Every year, in the winter months, people get angry, journalists write and produce reports, politicians blame each other and courts fume - until we do it all over again the next year.

35A public health emergency like this would spark mass protests in most democracies. 36But the anger in Delhi is mostly limited to social media.

37Activists say the reason is that pollution doesn’t cause immediate problems for most people. 38Ingesting high levels of PM2.5 deteriorates health slowly. 39A Lancet study found that pollution led to more than 2.3 million premature deaths in India in 2019.

40And then there is the class divide. 41People who can afford to temporarily leave the city do that, those who can buy air purifiers do that, and those who can vent on social media do that.

42The rest, who don't have these options, just go about their lives.

43The collective angst has so far not resulted in a massive protest and, as the Supreme Court once observed, politicians just “pass the buck” and wait for the season to get over.

44Experts say governments at the federal level and in different states need to leave their party politics behind and work together to solve this problem. 45They need to focus on long-term solutions.

46And citizens need to hold politicians accountable and courts have to pass decisive orders months before the pollution worsens.

47This year, we are again in the thick of the season and temporary measures have been announced, like banning construction work.

48But can these bring Delhi's elusive blue skies back? 49The evidence from the past few years doesn’t give much hope.

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from BBC