As the festival of light approaches, guidelines are in place to ensure pollution is curbed. The Delhi government recently banned firecrackers till January 1, amid the worsening Air Quality Index (AQI). However, some other states have permitted green firecrackers, which are supposedly less harmful to the environment.
The practice of bursting these “eco-friendly” crackers on Diwali goes back to 2018 when the Supreme Court banned the traditional crackers and promoted green firecrackers, which are less polluting and produce 30 per cent less noise than the conventional ones. According to the CSIR-National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI), green crackers are made with a reduced shell size, no ash, and minimal use of raw materials and additives such as dust suppressants to reduce emissions with specific reference to Particulate Matter (PM).