The Supreme Court on Wednesday stressed the need to stop crop residue burning, which affects air quality in the Delhi-National Capital Region (NCR) and asked state governments to take steps to curb pollution.
A team of three government officials was allegedly held hostage by a group of farmers in Haryana's Ambala district on Thursday when they were on patrol to check stubble burning.
Experts have indicated that the current impact of stubble burning on Delhi s air quality is minimal, but this may change as wind conditions are expected to calm down. Punjab recorded 656 paddy-residue burning incidents, while Haryana saw 166, and Uttar Pradesh reported 74 cases between September 15 and October 4. The daily count of fires in these states surpasses 6,000 at its peak.
The share of stubble burning in Delhi PM2.5 pollution rose to 32 per cent on Wednesday, the highest this year so far, amid raging farm fires in Punjab and favourable conditions for transport of emissions to Delhi-NCR.