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Tuesday brought inhabitants of the world's most polluted city found themselves inhaling extremely polluted air that registered in the "severe" category.

Alarming Pollution Measurements

Several parts of the city recorded an pollution measurement above 500, which represents a tenfold increase over the safe level established by the World Health Organization.

Certain monitoring stations, levels of toxic particulate matter reached peaks of eighteen hundred, amounting to fifteen to twenty times above acceptable standards.

Pyrotechnics Ban and Recent Policy Shifts

For the past four years, officials had maintained a complete ban on the distribution and bursting of pyrotechnics during the Festival of Lights due to their major role to the deadly smog that engulfs the metropolis as winter begins.

Yet earlier this year, the newly elected local government petitioned the judicial authority to request a easing of the restrictions.

They proposed allowing "environmentally conscious pyrotechnics" – which have been questioned by conservation groups as being only approximately one-third less polluting – as a middle ground between "tradition and ecological concerns".

Judicial Verdict and Enforcement

To the disappointment of public health and environmental advocates, judicial authorities agreed to the appeal, specifying that green firecrackers could be used during designated hours throughout the Diwali.

On Monday night, there was extensive disregard of the time restrictions across the city, with insufficient enforcement regarding whether the firecrackers being used were actually the supposedly greener variety.

Several recording stations throughout the city recorded contamination peaking around late evening to extremely hazardous measurements seen during Diwali in at least recent memory.

Regional Effects

The widespread use of pyrotechnics during the celebrations also triggered a blame game with adjacent Pakistan, with officials in Pakistani Punjab province partly blaming declining atmospheric conditions in their urban centers on pollutants coming from India following the celebrations.

Persistent Pollution Issue

Extremely elevated levels of atmospheric toxins in the city have continued as a major issue for more than 15 years, with the situation gradually deteriorating.

Around the festival period, the amount of toxic particulate matter in the air has been found to spike to seventy percent above the most severe levels ever recorded in the Chinese city, which was once considered as the world's most polluted urban center.

Various Pollution Factors

The problem in Delhi is caused by a combination of multiple factors including transportation pollution, construction debris, building projects, waste incineration and pollutants from crop residue ignition in adjacent areas of neighboring agricultural zones.

Within these states, farmers illegally set their fields on fire to clear them quickly, generating hazardous pollution that then gets trapped over the metropolitan area as winter air descends.

Medical and Economic Toll

Both financial and medical consequences on the nearly 33 million inhabitants living in the metropolitan zone is significant, according to multiple research.

These hazardous conditions results in increased incidence of neurological, cardiovascular and breathing conditions, and can potentially cause malignancies.

Environmental contamination is projected to be responsible for approximately 10k untimely deaths annually in the capital.