Animals and humans, all are fair game.

"India heads the list of countries with the highest annual average exposures to PM 2.5 - fine particulate matter hazardous to health - and the third highest average ozone exposures in the world, with a 17% increase in the last decade." 1.67 million, including 116,000 infants die of pollution every year. The pollution level in the national capital Delhi is deemed to be hazardous this morning.  "Under the National Clean Air Program (NCAP), the central government had approved the clean air plans in more than 100 cities in 2019. The program aims to cut down pollution levels in these cities by 20-30% by 2024 (with 2017 as the base year). But there are serious questions about NCAP's effectiveness," wrote Tauseef Shahidi. "New Delhi has the worst air of any capital on the planet, according to IQAirVisual, a Swiss-based group that gathers air quality data globally," wrote Bhardwaj and Arora. "Delhi has blamed farmers burning crop stubble in the neighboring states for its sickly air", but "more than half the pollutants in Delhi's air are the result of vehicular emissions, toxic waste and smoke from thousands of small unregulated industrial units and dust from never-ending construction". "About 78% of the cities exceeded PM10 standards compared to 36% for PM2.5, 9% for NO2 and none for SO2," wrote Chandra Bhushan. "The three easiest things to do" is "stopping farm fires; preventing the burning of garbage; and prohibiting the use of diesel generators, not just in Delhi, but in entire NCR (National Capital Region)". wrote Chanakya. This is not being done because different parties govern Delhi, Haryana and Punjab. State-run electricity generating company NTPC said that thermal power plants are not responsible for pollution in Delhi/NCR. "Stubble burning in northern India has long been a major cause of air pollution, but efforts to stop it fail every year,' wrote Pathi and Chhabra. Farmers are a crucial vote bank, and so "court orders like bans and fines remain unenforced". "Stubble burning incidents saw a steep rise of more than 20 percent this year in comparison to the last two years," said KJ Ramesh. "The situation of air pollution in Delhi is still serious. Stubble burning has stopped but Delhi's air quality index still remains in 'very poor' category," Union Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar said. Even as "their fellow citizens were distracted by pandemic related anxieties", the National Board for Wildlife, at the direction of Mr Javadekar, "successively rubber stamped approvals for an astonishing 16 proposals impinging on ostensibly sacrosanct national parks and wildlife sanctuaries", wrote Vivek Menezes. Speaking with forked tongue. Thick skinned.