As the city is soaked in the festive fervour with varieties of lights illuminating the streets and homes, but alarming level of pollution due to busting of firecrackers continues to worry environmentalists. This is because emission of smokes pollute the environment. It causes breathlessness and health problems, particularly to children and senior citizens, environmentalists said. The level of pollution during Kali Puja and Diwali can be understood from last year’s statistics provided by the state pollution control board.

According to the data, on the day of last year’s Kali Puja, the level of PM10, the safe limit of which is 100 micrograms per cubic metre, shot up to abnormally high level. On the day of Diwali, it crossed the 1700 mark from normal 800 mark. On the day of immersion, the PM10 level reached 1250 micrograms per cubic metre. The figure of more alarming PM 2.5 was no less worrying when its level, which otherwise has a standard limit of 60 micrograms per cubic metre, touched 650 mic-G/m3 on Kali Puja, 1120 on Diwali and 225 mic-G/m3 on the day of immersion.

Although the noise pollution, according to the environmentalists, has been brought down in the recent years to some extent, the air pollution caused from the smoke of fire crackers still remains a cause of worry. The green crackers though are considered as saving grace, but they are not completely green. “Although they cut down the pollution by 30 per cent with lesser toxic materials, the overall impact of these crackers on the environment is slightly less polluting than the conventional crackers,” said a noted city environmentalist.

“The green crackers might be less polluting but are not pollution-free. They also cause air pollution,” said Mr Kalyan Rudra, chairman of West Bengal Pollution Control Board. “There is no firecracker manufactured so far, which is absolutely environment friendly,” he added. Even the smoke generated from burning of candles has adverse effects on health. “The smoke of a big candle causes more health problems than smoke emnatted from several cigarettes,” a noted asthma specialist said. The high level of pollution is dangerous to health of not only the vulnerable group, but also to people who are otherwise healthy and normal.

“The increased air pollution generally aggravates problems of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), asthma and other respiratory disorders to vulnerable people. The increased air pollution, however, is detrimental to anybody but particularly for children and elderly. Also those with other respiratory problems suffer more when compared to normal people,” said professor AG Ghoshal, director, National Allergy Asthma Bronchitis Institute. “It has been observed that the number of emergency visits and hospitalisation due to respiratory disorders generally increase after the festive season, particularly post Diwali” added the professor.