Air Pollution: Gurugram primary schools to reopen after weeklong closure

GURUGRAM: Classes from nursery to five, which were suspended due to high air pollution levels in the district, are set to resume, authorities said on Monday. The Gurugram administration had on November 6 ordered closure of primary schools till further orders to protect schoolchildren from rising pollution in the National Capital Region (NCR).

District Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) Chairman and Deputy Commissioner Nishant Kumar Yadav has issued orders to withdraw the November 6 decision. Now, primary schools across the district can resume classes in offline mode. In order to avoid disruption, orders were given to school managements to continue studies in online mode only, but now the orders have been withdrawn with immediate effect, the latest order read.

Meanwhile, air quality in Gurugram was recorded in the "very poor" category on Monday, a day after Diwali. The air quality index (AQI) of the city was recorded at 349 on Monday, which was up to seven times higher than normal. Last year, the AQI of Gurugram was recorded at 257 on the day after Diwali. The AQI of Manesar was recorded at 328 on Monday as compared to 224 recorded a day after Diwali in 2022.

According to experts, due to the rain last week before Diwali, the city residents got some respite, but the air quality once again deteriorated after fireworks on Sunday. The Meteorological department said there is no possibility of rain in the coming days. On Monday morning, the sky was also covered with haze due to the air pollution. The visibility remained between 800 metres to one kilometer from 7 am to 2 pm. The visibility slightly improved later and increased to two kilometers.