On the morning of November 18, 2024, I awoke to the pre-light of dawn filtering in through shuttered curtains. The night had been rough, with my three-month-old daughter waking me frequently. A cup of coffee was in order before I woke my eight-year-old son for school. As I groggily opened the curtains to prepare for the day, however, an alarming scene met my eyes.
A grey smog engulfed everything visible to the eye. The tree-lined community gardens outside our central Delhi home, were reduced to mere shapes and shadows, and the foliage nearest us was laden with layers of dust.
Having lived in New Delhi, the capital of India, most of my life, I have come to expect high levels of pollution between the months of November to January. Firecrackers set off during Diwali celebrations, farmers burning their crops in the neighboring state of Punjab in preparation for next season’s harvest, and rapid construction around the city, are largely to blame for this annual recurrence.
In the days running up to this bleak morning, the Air Quality Index (AQI) marker had hovered between 200 (unhealthy) and 350 (hazardous to health). We grumbled about the dismal state of affairs but went on with our lives. Yet, that day the AQI had crossed 750 on the Indian tracker and 1300 on the tracker placed outside the US Embassy, affirming that New Delhi was the most polluted city globally.
The many WhatsApp groups I’m a member of, were blowing up with irate citizens expressing their frustration at the situation and berating the government about its temporary measures akin to a band-aid being applied on a deep gash that needed suturing and dedicated care.
For the most affluent of those complaining – including many of my friends and extended family members – this was the sign to pack up and escape to greener pastures. With pollution becoming worse every year it wasn’t unusual for those with the means, to move lock, stock and barrel to India’s hill stations in the north or the balmy beaches of Goa in the south. Unfortunately, this wasn’t an option for my family. I was nursing a newborn, and my 79-year-old mother-in-law was receiving medical care at home for advanced dementia.
We did the best we could. My son’s school transitioned to online learning. We added to our already significant stash of air purifiers at home and barricaded ourselves from the outside by shutting the doors and windows. Yet, I grappled with worry that these measures weren’t enough to protect the health of my loved ones at the most vulnerable stages of life.
Unbidden, my brain conjured the worst possible scenarios on loop. Would my newborn develop a racking cough or other pollution-related ailment as her immunity wasn’t yet at its strongest? Would I fall ill, in turn compromising my ability to nurture her? Would my older child suffer, forcing me to divert my attention away from the baby’s needs? Would my severely ill mother-in-law be further affected?
Further, as we basked in the comfort of the expensive purified air we had purchased, my thoughts drifted to my fellow citizens, who neither had the privilege of leaving the city nor the means to safeguard their health. There were millions living in poverty, for whom a daily wage meant food on the table for the many mouths’ dependent on them. They didn’t even have access to basic protective gear like masks, let alone quality healthcare for when they invariably fell ill owing to the high level of pollution exposure!
Perhaps even more than anxiety, however, I felt anger. I was furious at the authorities for not giving the issue the attention it deserved; for the apathy that allowed each political party – the one in power at the state level and the one in power at the center, both of which have their seat in Delhi – to use the subject as political bait to blame their rivals. Most of all, I was upset at the attitude of resignation most Delhiites had, which stopped them from rallying together to demand lasting change.
As I write this piece, LA burns on the other side of the world, and I’m horrified to witness the acute level of devastation. Thousands of families have been forced to evacuate, many of whom have lost their homes and possessions, owing to a terrifying climate calamity. I can’t help but compare our situations. While the level of physical devastation caused by Delhi’s pollution isn’t at par with that of the LA wildfires, the long-term effects of both these natural occurrences are debilitating.
Hence, witnessing the citizens of America uniting as one to help with relief efforts for wildfire victims gives me hope for a better future for my city. When the community comes together to pursue collective action, change is inevitable. Severe air pollution has been overturned in cities like Beijing and London in the past. Perhaps if the people of Delhi stood as one, we too could solve this problem once and for all.
Though changes at an institutional level aren’t in our hands, we could start small – preferring to walk or join carpools, plant more trees to absorb the pollutants, and avoid burning fires outdoors in the name of cultural celebrations or as in the case of farmers, to save money.
This cold January morning, the air was cleaner and crisper than it had been for months, as overnight rains washed away the worst of the smog. As usual, I woke up flustered and sleep deprived but when I opened the curtains to my window, I felt an overwhelming sense of calm. My son bustled about getting ready for school, my daughter cooed and gurgled away in her cot, and my mother-in-law slept peacefully in her room. For the briefest of moments, all was right with the world.
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This essay was originally submitted to another publication but couldn’t be published there, so I’m giving it a home on my blog. After all, the purpose of a blog was to share one’s feelings about things that matter right? What do you feel about Delhi’s pollution if you live in the NCR region? Let me know in the comments below.
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This blog post is part of ‘Blogaberry Dazzle’ hosted by Cindy D’Silva and Noor Anand Chawla
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*This is not a sponsored post.
**Copyright in pictures and content belongs to nooranandchawla.com and cannot be republished or repurposed without express permission of the author. As I am a copyright lawyer by profession, infringement of any kind will invite strict legal action.
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