New Delhi: Delhi woke up on Tuesday to air that remained in the “very poor” bracket across most busy pockets, even as GRAP-2 stayed in force.

A six-location snapshot between around 7 am and 9 am showed Akshardham at 358, India Gate at 342, RK Puram at 330, INA-AIIMS at 368, Dilli Haat INA at 368 and ITO at 259. The simple average of these six points comes to about 338, placing conditions firmly in “very poor”.

Set against last year’s day-after-Diwali morning, the comparison is meaningful. On November 1, 2024, Delhi’s citywide AQI at 9 am was 362 and the 24-hour average by 4 pm was 339.

Today’s six-point morning mean of ~338 is around 7 per cent lower than the 9 am figure last year and almost identical to the 24-hour average Delhi recorded by late afternoon in 2024.

In spread terms, fiv

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