Photo: AFP
Toxic smog enveloped India's iconic Taj Mahal and the sacred Golden Temple in Amritsar, causing flight delays and severely reducing visibility on Thursday.
Photo: AFP
Volunteers cleaned the holy sarovar at the Golden Temple in Amritsar on November 2, 2024, a day after the Sikh festival Bandi Chhor Divas, as thick smog engulfed the area.
The city of Lahore in neighboring Pakistan was ranked as the world's most polluted during the region's annual winter smog, exacerbated by dust, emissions, and illegal fires in India's farming states of Punjab and Haryana.
People walked to board trains amid smog and air pollution at a railway station in Lahore, Pakistan on November 14, 2024. Reuters
Photo: AFP
In Agra, the Taj Mahal was barely visible from the gardens in front of the 17th-century monument, while dense fog surrounded worshippers at the Golden Temple in Punjab, according to television images. Flight delays were reported in Delhi, with Flightradar24 showing 88% of departures and 54% of arrivals delayed.
Officials attributed the smog to high pollution levels, humidity, stagnant winds, and a drop in temperature, which reduced visibility to 300 meters (980 feet) at the city's international airport, causing flight diversions on Wednesday due to zero visibility.
More patients, particularly children, flocked to hospitals. "There has been a sudden increase in children with allergies, cough, and cold... and a rise in acute asthma attacks," said Sahab Ram, a pediatrician in Punjab's Fazilka region, in an interview with news agency ANI.
Delhi's minimum temperature dropped to 16.1 degrees Celsius (61°F) on Thursday from 17 degrees C (63 degrees F) the previous day, according to weather officials.
Boatmen waited on the banks of the Yamuna River engulfed in smog in New Delhi on November 14, 2024. AFP
A man fed seagulls in the waters of the Yamuna River engulfed in smog in New Delhi on November 14, 2024. AFP
An aerial view showed houses engulfed in smog in New Delhi on November 14, 2024. AFP
Delhi's pollution was categorized as 'severe' for the second consecutive day, with a score of 430 on an air quality index maintained by the top pollution panel, which rates a score of zero to 50 as 'good'. Pollution in New Delhi is expected to remain in the 'severe' category on Friday before improving to 'very poor'.
The number of farm fires to clear fields in northern India has increased steadily this week, rising to almost 2,300 on Wednesday from 1,200 on Monday, according to the ministry's website. Lahore, the capital of Pakistan's eastern province of Punjab, was rated the world's most polluted city on Thursday, according to live rankings kept by Swiss group IQAir. Authorities in Lahore have also been dealing with hazardous air quality this month.
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