Schools closed in New Delhi on Friday, while some diesel-burning vehicles were ordered off the roads and much of the city’s incessant construction was halted, as the authorities tried to mitigate the effects of a thick haze of pollution that has descended on India’s capital, a calamity that has come to be an annual blight.
Despite the mandates, and an appeal to people to stay indoors, the measures provided little relief for the city’s many millions of residents.
“Breathing becomes heavy and long,” said Ram Kumar, a 30-year-old from the city of Gorakhpur, in the more rural north of India, who supports his family back home by driving an auto-rickshaw in New Delhi.
In June, during Canada’s worst-ever wildfire season, New York saw its skies turn orange from the smoke that wafted over, with residents suffering from that type of pollution at a concentration of about 117 micrograms per cubic meter.
By comparison, on Friday afternoon in Delhi, the average was around 500, reaching 643 in some places.
Persons:
”, Ram Kumar
Locations:
New Delhi, Gorakhpur, India, “, New York, Delhi