Slight air quality relief for city post-Diwali amid continued firecracker pollution
Telegraph | 23 October 2025
Air quality readings in only one monitoring station — Rabindra Bharati University’s BT Road campus — improved to the “satisfactory” category on Wednesday morning.
At 11am, the Jadavpur station reported “poor” air quality, while four others — Ballygunge, Bidhannagar, Fort William, and Rabindra Sarobar — recorded “moderate” levels. Readings were unavailable at the Victoria Memorial station.
According to the National Air Quality Index, prepared by the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB): Poor air quality can cause “breathing discomfort to most people on prolonged exposure”, moderate air quality may cause “breathing discomfort to people with lungs, asthma and heart diseases”, and satisfactory air can cause “minor breathing discomfort to sensitive people”.
The city’s air quality had deteriorated sharply on Tuesday morning, the day after Diwali, compared to Monday morning. Experts linked the drop directly to the indiscriminate bursting of firecrackers and the emissions they produced.
At 7am on Tuesday, the air quality at Victoria Memorial was categorised as “poor”, while six other stations — Bidhannagar, Jadavpur, Ballygunge, Fort William, Rabindra Bharati University (BT Road), and Rabindra Sarobar — showed “moderate” readings.
Conditions were better on Monday morning, when only Victoria Memorial and Jadavpur stations reported “moderate” air, and the others showed “satisfactory” levels.
Experts attributed the slight improvement on Wednesday morning to a marginal clearing of pollutants, but said overall air quality remains poor due to lingering emissions and unfavourable weather.
“We have a stable atmosphere now where the pollutants are not getting dispersed. As a result the sudden and huge addition of pollutants is floating in the air. Pollutants were already in the air from Diwali night and more were added on Tuesday night,” said Abhijit Chatterjee, professor of chemical sciences at Bose Institute.
He added: “If there is a slowdown in the burning of fireworks over the next few days, the air quality will gradually improve.”
Air quality management experts said the city is currently in a transition phase between the end of monsoon and onset of winter, making it harder for pollutants to disperse.
“Warmer temperatures would have helped, as would higher wind speed or rain, which can wash away pollutants,” one scientist said.
Calcuttans, however, were spared a worse air quality scenario because of an early Diwali. A later Diwali would have meant lower temperatures, which could trap pollutants closer to the ground for longer.
Doctors warned that both acute and chronic exposure to polluted air can affect health.
“Irritation of the nose and eyes, and a transient increase in blood pressure can happen due to acute exposure,” said Arup Halder, consultant pulmonologist at CMRI.
Another doctor said that people with pre-existing respiratory conditions like asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) may experience worsening symptoms during such periods of poor air quality.