Subheadline: CAQM’s directive asks NCR states to map emissions, assign officials and prepare hotspot-specific plans, exposing the gap between identifying pollution sources and controlling them.
Standfirst: The Commission for Air Quality Management has asked Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh to identify pollution hotspots in their National Capital Region areas and prepare detailed action plans. Delhi, meanwhile, has been asked to update its existing hotspot list and submit a revised implementation plan. The directive reflects a more localised approach to air pollution governance: instead of treating Delhi-NCR’s air as a single regional problem, authorities are being asked to identify specific sources, locations and administrative responsibilities. The available record also shows why that shift matters. Delhi’s earlier exercise identified major and minor sources across 13 hotspots, but a significant share of those problems remained under monitoring or pending. The central question is whether the new planning process can convert inventories into accountable, measurable action.
The Commission for Air Quality Management’s latest direction places pollution hotspots at the centre of Delhi-NCR’s air-quality response. In a letter dated August 24, CAQM asked the pollution control boards of Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh to identify hotspots in their respective NCR areas, assess major emission sources and prepare detailed plans for controlling them. Delhi has been asked to update its own list of hotspots and submit a revised action plan.
CAQM also wants each hotspot to have a designated nodal officer responsible for implementing the proposed measures. The commission said it was working to address air pollution at the local level through focused action in identified hotspots, according to a public post cited in the source material. The directive therefore links three tasks that are often treated separately: locating pollution, identifying its sources and assigning responsibility for remediation.
This is significant because the administrative geography of Delhi-NCR does not match the experience of pollution for residents. Air moves across state boundaries, while many emission sources are controlled by municipal bodies, pollution control boards, transport agencies, construction authorities or local enforcement teams. CAQM’s direction does not remove that institutional complexity, but it asks states and Delhi to organise their responses around specific locations rather than only around the region as a whole.
The source material does not provide the number of hotspots that Haryana, Rajasthan or Uttar Pradesh will identify, nor does it set out a common deadline for submitting their plans. It does, however, specify the expected contents of those plans: pollution sources must be identified, emissions assessed and measures to control them outlined. Each hotspot must also have a nodal officer responsible for implementation.
For Delhi, the immediate task is to revise an existing system. The Delhi Pollution Control Committee has been asked to update the list of hotspots and submit a revised hotspot action plan, including details of the officers responsible for implementation. That requirement places the capital’s earlier hotspot exercise in a new administrative cycle rather than treating it as a completed intervention.
Delhi’s 2023 inventory, referred to by CAQM, marked areas as hotspots when annual average PM10 levels exceeded 300 micrograms per cubic metre or PM2.5 levels exceeded 100 micrograms per cubic metre. PM10 and PM2.5 are particulate pollutants that can enter the respiratory system and are linked to a range of health problems, according to the source report. The thresholds provide a technical basis for identifying areas requiring focused attention, but they do not by themselves establish which source should be controlled first or which authority must act.
The earlier exercise also identified 65 major pollution sources across 13 Delhi hotspots. Of these, 16 had been resolved, 43 remained under continued monitoring and six were still pending at the time of the review described in the report. These figures show a mixed implementation record. They indicate that the hotspot approach produced a list of interventions and some completed actions, but also left most of the identified major sources either unresolved or subject to ongoing monitoring.
The distinction between resolution, monitoring and pending action is important for understanding the governance challenge. Monitoring can be necessary where a source requires repeated checks, but it does not necessarily mean that emissions have been reduced. Similarly, identifying a source is not the same as controlling it. The new directive’s emphasis on action plans and nodal officers appears designed to address that gap by attaching implementation responsibility to each hotspot.
The list of minor sources identified in Delhi was considerably larger. The department recorded 4,555 such sources across the 13 hotspots. These included road dust, garbage and construction-waste dumping, potholes, unpaved roads, traffic congestion and open waste burning. Nearly half of these problems had been addressed at the time of the review, according to the supplied report.
That list reveals the layered nature of local air pollution. Some sources are directly associated with emissions, such as open waste burning. Others, including potholes, unpaved roads and construction-waste dumping, can contribute to dust or create conditions that make pollution-control measures harder to sustain. Traffic congestion adds another local pressure. The source material does not quantify the contribution of each category, so it is not possible to rank them or determine which provided the largest reduction when addressed.
The broader policy shift is therefore not simply from one pollution list to another. It is from general identification towards a more detailed implementation framework. A hotspot action plan is expected to identify the source, assess emissions, specify control measures and name the official responsible for delivery. In principle, this creates a chain connecting evidence to administration. In practice, the effectiveness of that chain will depend on whether the plans contain measurable actions and whether the designated officers have authority to coordinate the agencies involved.
The supplied material does not describe the funding arrangements, enforcement powers or institutional mechanisms that will support the nodal officers. It also does not say whether the plans will use a common methodology across the NCR states. Those omissions matter because a pollution hotspot can contain several types of sources under different authorities. Road dust, waste dumping, construction activity, traffic management and open burning may not be controlled by the same agency, even within one location.
CAQM’s directive places responsibility on the NCR state governments, the Government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi and their pollution-control institutions. Delhi’s revised plan is specifically linked to the Delhi Pollution Control Committee, while the state-level plans in Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh are to be prepared after identifying hotspots in their NCR areas. The arrangement reflects the region’s federal and multi-agency structure: a regional commission is setting the direction, but implementation remains distributed across state and local institutions.
The available data also shows why a localised strategy may be necessary. Delhi’s previous exercise covered 13 hotspots, 65 major sources and 4,555 minor sources. Within the major-source category, 16 were resolved, 43 remained under monitoring and six were pending. Within the minor-source category, nearly half had been addressed. These numbers describe the scale of the task, but they do not establish whether air-quality readings improved at each location after individual interventions. The next plans will need to connect action on sources with evidence of results if their performance is to be assessed.
This is the central data gap in the current account. The source identifies pollution thresholds, numbers of sources and the status of interventions, but it does not provide updated hotspot-level PM10 or PM2.5 readings, before-and-after comparisons or timelines for completing pending measures. Without those details, the public can see how many sources have been listed or reviewed, but not yet whether the interventions have produced sustained improvements in air quality.
The directive also raises a question about how the NCR will define success. A hotspot-specific plan could be judged by whether sources are mapped, officers appointed and measures announced. A more demanding assessment would require evidence that identified sources have been controlled and that local pollution levels have changed. The supplied material confirms the first set of administrative requirements but does not establish the second.
For cities, the larger issue is the conversion of environmental data into routine urban management. Road conditions, waste handling, construction practices, traffic movement and burning are all local governance matters with direct implications for air quality. Treating them as pollution sources makes them part of the air-quality agenda, but it also requires coordination beyond pollution-control departments.
CAQM’s direction thus tests whether hotspot mapping can become an operating system for urban enforcement rather than another inventory. Delhi’s previous exercise shows both the usefulness and the limits of that approach: authorities were able to identify hundreds of major and thousands of minor sources, yet several major sources remained under monitoring or pending. The new plans will reveal whether the process produces clearer responsibilities and more consistent follow-through across the wider NCR.
What is established is that CAQM has asked NCR states to prepare hotspot action plans, Delhi to update its list and authorities to assign nodal officers. What remains unclear from the supplied information is when the plans will be submitted, how their measures will be financed and enforced, and what common indicators will be used to measure improvement. Those details will determine whether the latest directive marks a substantive change in pollution governance or another expansion of the region’s existing catalogue of pollution sources.
