Air pollution goes through the roof in parts of Delhi on Deepavali night

New Delhi: As Delhiites burst firecrackers well past the 10 p.m. deadline set by the Supreme Court for Deepavali night, air pollution shot up to over 150-200 times World Health Organisation (WHO) limits in parts of the city, but fell through the early morning hours of Monday (November 9, 2026) due to better weather conditions, show official data.

At the peak of pollution, following the bursting of firecrackers on Sunday night, crucial air quality data were missing from several monitoring stations managed by government authorities. Experts say missing data on peak values of air pollution will artificially show better air quality than the reality.

At peak of air pollution on Deepavali, data goes missing at several government monitoring stations in Delhi At peak of air pollution on Deepavali, data goes missing at several government monitoring stations in Delhi Missing PM2.5 data for several hours on CPCB website understated city’s pollution levels: experts; 227 PM2.5 observations were missing across 59 stations; govt.