With a little respite for the city’s residents amid the bad air situation, Delhi’s average Air Quality Index (AQI) levels on Sunday witnessed some improvement, stepping from ‘very poor’ to ‘poor’ category.

The Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB)’s daily AQI bulletin on Sunday said that the national capital’s average air quality level was recorded at 285, reeling under the ‘poor’ category, which was 61 points less severe, as compared to Saturday’s ‘346’.

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Prominent pollutants in the city’s air were the PM 2.5 and PM 10 particles, and the data put up by the pollution monitoring agency was based on the readings from 38 monitoring stations across the city.

However, there were 10 areas across the city that recorded air in the ‘very poor’ zone, the worst affected places included Mundka with an AQI reading of 330, Shadipur- 327 and Nehru Nagar – 323.

A person who had come to Connaught Place on Sunday mentioned that the situation was slightly better as compared to past couple of days in terms of ease in breathing.

According to the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, the ventilation index is likely to be 4200 m2/s on Monday, 7000 m2/s on Tuesday and 11000 m2/s Wednesday over the city.

As per the weather agency, “The ventilation index lower than 6000 m2/s with average wind speed less than 10 kmph is unfavourable for dispersion of pollutants”.

However, the measures under the Commission for Air Quality Management’s (CAQM) anti- pollution Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) remain in force, other than a few exceptions announced by the agency earlier.

Government agencies are implementing a host of steps to mitigate the pollutants from city’s air, that include deployment of anti- smog guns, mechanical sweepers to curb dust generated on roads, while the traffic police and transport department are conducting drives to keep a check on the polluting vehicles and to prevent vehicles restricted under GRAP from plying on national capital’s roads.

A large number of vehicles operating with invalid pollution under control certificates have been fined by the agencies concerned.