Stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana did not influence Delhi's AQI in 2024-2026: Report

Stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana did not influence Delhi's AQI in 2024-2026: Report

New Delhi, A new analysis of Delhi AQI data for September-October of 2024-2026 has found that the air quality in the national capital was barely influenced by stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana, according to a Delhi-based climate research organisation's analysis released on Wednesday.

Stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana did not influence Delhi's AQI in 2024-2026: Report

The report by Climate Trends further said that local, non-agricultural sources played a larger role in determining Delhi's air quality.

Fire events in Punjab and Haryana were essentially unchanged between 2025 and 2026, down just four per cent , yet Delhi's AQI fell 15.8 per cent over the same period. Between 2024 and 2025, by contrast, fires dropped 88 per cent while Delhi's AQI fell 3.9 per cent, it said.

However, the report highlighted that Delhi AQI's improvement in recent years hides "a worse ordinary day."

It states that while mean AQI fell from 169.3 to 142.6 between 2025 and 2026 – a 15.8 per cent drop – the median AQI, the one most people in Delhi actually breathed, got dirtier. The median AQI rose from 135 to 154, up 14.1 per cent in the same period.

Notably, the mean AQI is the plain average of every day's readings, while the median AQI is the middle value in the daily readings arranged from lowest to highest.

The median AQI is considered a better measure of the ordinary, typical day, and is barely affected by one or two extreme spikes.

"The improvement comes almost entirely from the near-disappearance of extreme days: AQI above 200 fell from 10 days to three, and nothing crossed 300, compared with a peak of 353 the year before. This is a flattening of the worst spikes, not a cleaner autumn overall," the analysis said.

It also found that in the September-October period this year, weather conditions, which should have typically worsened pollution, did not do so, because of strengthening El Nino conditions and a fall in rainfall, which was 78.2 per cent lower during the period compared to the corresponding period in 2025.

"This narrows the likely explanation toward something changing in Delhi's own emissions rather than the sky or the fields," the analysis said.

This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text.