Calling India’s air pollution crisis a “full-blown assault on our brains and bodies”, Congress leader Jairam Ramesh on Sunday said the government’s failure to curb toxic air had turned the issue into both a public health catastrophe and a national security threat.

Citing the State of Global Air 2025 report, Ramesh said nearly two million deaths in India in 2023 were linked to air pollution, a 43 per cent increase since 2000, with nine out of ten of these deaths caused by non-communicable diseases such as heart disease, lung cancer, diabetes and dementia. The report, shared by him on X, provides a global analysis of air quality and related health impacts.

“India records around 186 air-pollution deaths per 100,000 people, more than ten times the rate in high-income countries,” Ramesh wrote

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