AQI reaches 238 on Kali Puja night eve, green lobby presses panic button

Kolkata, Oct 19 (PTI) A day before Kali Puja, Kolkata's air quality hovered between 'unhealthy' and 'poor' range on Sunday, with the Air Quality Index (AQI) for PM2.5 reaching 238 at one monitoring station in the evening, causing alarm among environmentalists.

Some locations recorded 'moderate' levels (AQI above 178), while others remained in the 'unhealthy' range (AQI between 101-150), an official of West Bengal Pollution Control Board said.

At Victoria Memorial. the AQI read at 238 at 8 pm (poor). Other readings included: 155 at Ballygunge, 158 at Chetla, 186 at Jadavpur, and 171 at Manicktala — all classified as "moderate" though these translate to "extremely unhealthy" under environmental norms..

It was 105 at Bidhannagar, 134 at Fort William and 149 in the Harrington Street‑Park Street area, the official said.

Environmentalist Somendra Mohan Ghosh warned that "vulnerable groups may experience immediate health effects while healthy individuals may experience difficulty in breathing and throat irritation." Asked whether bursting of firecrackers could have caused the spike, the WBPCB official said, "Due to retreat of the south‑west monsoon, typical dry weather conditions during mid‑October to November are preventing the upward movement of fine particulate matters in the air, which has contributed to the spurt in AQI level." "Bursting of green firecrackers and fireworks are too stray and sporadic as the festival is yet to start. The WBPCB and police are alert and we will keep vigil on the situation from tomorrow," he said.

On October 18, the automated air monitoring stations in Jadavpur in the southern part of the city recorded AQI of 242, while the station at Rabindra Bharati University in Sinthi in the north registered AQI of 252, both categorised as "poor", the official said.

On October 17, AQI ranged between 179 and 185 (PM 2.5) at 4 pm in Jadavpur and Sinthi, respectively.

The AQI at RBI Air Monitoring station did not provide any data on Sunday, the official said, attributing it to technical flaws in uploading inputs.

Ghosh said, "As the night progressed, reports are pouring in on rampant bursting of firecrackers in different parts of the city." "I fear the AQI will touch 'very poor' and 'severe' categories later in the night and tomorrow on October 20," he said.

While poor air (201-300 AQI) quality causes breathing discomfort to most people on prolonged exposure, very poor air (301-400 AQI) causes respiratory illness with prolonged exposure. Severe air (401-500 AQI) affects even healthy people while seriously impacting those with existing diseases. PTI SUS MNB