India’s flagship air pollution control programme is reaching only a small share of the cities that are most affected by toxic air, a new analysis has found.
Contrary to popular belief, Delhi was not India’s most polluted city in terms of PM2.5 levels. That position was taken by Byrnihat, an industrial town located on the Assam–Meghalaya border, with Delhi and Ghaziabad following close behind.
According to the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), 190 Indian cities exceed the annual safe limit for PM10 pollution, while 103 cities breach the annual PM2.5 standard. The findings are part of CREA’s Tracing the Hazy Air 2026 assessment, which tracks long-term pollution trends using satellite data and ground-based monitoring.
Pollution on a massive scale
CREA analysed PM2.5 levels across 4,041 statutory towns in India. Of these, 1,787 cities crossed the national annual PM2.5 limit every year between 2019 and 2024, excluding the COVID-affected year of 2020.
This means nearly 44 per cent of Indian cities fall under the “chronic non-attainment” category — a classification for cities that have failed to meet national air quality standards for more than five consecutive years.
The study also pointed to sharp regional differences. Uttar Pradesh topped the list with 416 chronically polluted cities, followed by Rajasthan (158), Gujarat (152), Madhya Pradesh (143), Punjab and Bihar (136 each), and West Bengal (124).
Why Byrnihat tops the pollution list
Byrnihat’s severe pollution levels are largely linked to its dense industrial activity. The town hosts distilleries, iron and steel units, cement factories and beverage manufacturing plants.
Within an area of about 49.5 square kilometres, there are around 41 factories emitting large amounts of particulate matter. Compounding the problem is the absence of a strong pollution control authority in the region and weak enforcement, which allowed pollution levels to remain largely unchecked for years.
Clean air for some, not most
The analysis flagged another worrying gap. Despite the scale of chronic pollution, only around 4 per cent of India’s persistently polluted cities are currently covered under the National Clean Air Programme (NCAP).
Launched in 2019, NCAP was designed to tackle air pollution in the country’s most affected cities through coordinated action and stricter controls on major pollution sources. However, the programme currently covers only 130 cities. Of these, just 67 overlap with the chronically polluted cities identified in CREA’s analysis.
As a result, a vast majority of cities facing long-term air quality violations remain outside the programme’s scope.
Uneven progress under NCAP
Even among NCAP cities, progress has been mixed. Of the 130 cities, 28 still do not have continuous ambient air quality monitoring stations. Among the 102 cities that do, pollution trends vary widely.
While 23 cities managed to meet the revised target of a 40 per cent reduction in PM10 levels, another 23 recorded an increase in PM10 pollution since the programme began in 2019. The remaining cities showed only modest or moderate improvements, highlighting the limitations of current interventions.
Funding priorities raise concerns
Since its launch, Rs 13,415 crore has been released under NCAP, with about 74 per cent of the funds utilised so far. A large share of the spending — 68 per cent — has gone towards road dust management. Transport-related measures accounted for 14 per cent, while waste and biomass burning received 12 per cent.
Sectors directly responsible for emissions, such as industry and domestic fuel use, received less than 1 per cent of the funding each.
“India’s only way forward is to strengthen air quality governance through targeted, science-based reforms,” said Manoj Kumar, an analyst at CREA. He stressed the need to prioritise PM2.5 and its precursor gases, revise the list of non-attainment cities under NCAP, tighten emission standards for industries and power plants, and adopt an airshed-based approach to pollution control.
The analysis reinforces a growing consensus that India’s air pollution problem is structural and persistent. Driven by transport, industry and power generation, it is not limited to specific seasons or cities.
Without expanding NCAP’s coverage and focusing more sharply on cutting emissions at source, millions of urban residents are likely to continue breathing unsafe air, with long-term health consequences.