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The Commission for Air Quality Management in NCR and Adjoining Areas (CAQM) ran a Special Intensive Inspection Drive at Loni, Ghaziabad on 25 August 2026 under Operation Clean Air, targeting industrial units operating outside environmental regulatory mechanisms.
Seven flying squads, along with Magistrates, Police and Uttar Pradesh Pollution Control Board officials, inspected 28 industrial premises - and found all 28 non-compliant with applicable environmental norms.
Sixteen units or premises were sealed by UPPCB with the district administration and flying squads; six show cause notices were served, and notices were pasted on six further premises, including units found locked or vacated.
Statutory body for air quality management across the National Capital Region and adjoining areas, created by the Commission for Air Quality Management in National Capital Region and Adjoining Areas Act, 2021. It replaced the Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority (EPCA), which was dissolved. Its composition includes a full-time Chairperson, a Member-Secretary of Joint Secretary rank who is also Chief Coordinating Officer, a full-time member from the central government, three independent technical members and three members from non-government organisations, besides ex-officio members from the central and concerned state governments and technical members from the CPCB, ISRO and NITI Aayog.
National apex pollution regulator; sets the National Ambient Air Quality Standards and runs the air quality monitoring network, and nominates a technical member to CAQM. Constituted on 23 September 1974 under the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1974, and later given functions under the Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1981.
The State Pollution Control Board that grants Consent to Establish and Consent to Operate for industries in Uttar Pradesh, and which physically sealed the 16 defaulting premises in this drive.
Prepares the Regional Plan for the NCR and coordinates land use and infrastructure across state boundaries - the planning counterpart to CAQM's regulatory role over the same inter-state region. Constituted under the National Capital Region Planning Board Act, 1985.
The source of the Consent to Operate requirement - the commonest violation in this drive, found in 21 of 28 premises. Under Section 21, no industrial plant may be operated in an air pollution control area without the consent of the State Pollution Control Board, which is why running a furnace without a valid CTO is itself an offence regardless of measured emissions.
Constitutes CAQM as a statutory commission for the NCR and adjoining areas and gives it the inspection and enforcement powers exercised through the flying squads in this drive. Under the proviso to Section 14(1), the penal provisions do not apply to farmers, who instead face environmental compensation for stubble burning.
The umbrella environmental statute under which EPCA - the body CAQM replaced - had been constituted on Supreme Court directions. Section 15 of this Act was amended by the Jan Vishwas (Amendment of Provisions) Act, 2023, substituting monetary penalties for imprisonment in several violations.
Framed under the CAQM Act and notified after Supreme Court criticism, these doubled the environmental compensation for farm fires: Rs 5,000 for holdings below two acres, Rs 10,000 for two to five acres and Rs 30,000 for above five acres, per incident.
Created the statutory basis for treating Delhi and adjoining districts of Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan as a single planning region - the same inter-state logic that later justified an air quality commission with jurisdiction beyond Delhi's borders.
Air does not stop at a state boundary. Delhi's pollution is produced partly inside the city and partly in Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and Rajasthan, so a regulator confined to the National Capital Territory can only ever address a fraction of the problem. That is the reasoning behind a body whose remit is the NCR and adjoining areas - the airshed, not the administrative unit. It is also why a drive against small furnaces in Loni, a town in Ghaziabad district of Uttar Pradesh, is run by a central statutory commission with the state pollution control board executing the sealing on the ground. The same argument explains the shift in 2021 from EPCA, an authority notified under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 on Supreme Court directions, to a commission with its own Act of Parliament, a full-time chairperson and permanent enforcement machinery.
Simple Analogy: Regulating Delhi's air from within Delhi alone is like banning smoking in one room of a house that has no doors.
| Stage | Air quality category | AQI range |
|---|---|---|
| Stage I | Poor | 201-300 |
| Stage II | Very Poor | 301-400 |
| Stage III | Severe | 401-450 |
| Stage IV | Severe Plus | Above 450 |
Pre-set emergency measures for Delhi-NCR that switch on automatically as the Air Quality Index deteriorates, instead of being decided afresh in each pollution episode.
Key: Notified and brought into effect in 2017 and initially implemented by EPCA under Supreme Court mandates; executed since 2021 by CAQM in coordination with the MoEFCC, state pollution control boards and local authorities. Four stages linked to AQI bands from Poor to Severe Plus.
National programme launched by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change in January 2019 to improve air quality in 131 cities - non-attainment cities and million-plus cities - across 24 States and Union Territories.
Key: Targets a reduction of up to 40 per cent in PM10 concentrations, or attainment of the National Ambient Air Quality Standards, by 2025-26 against a 2019-20 base year. It was India's first instance of performance-linked funding for air quality, and CPCB has set annual PM10 reduction targets of 3 to 15 per cent for 82 cities.
CAQM's continuing enforcement drive against illegal and polluting industrial units in the NCR - the campaign under which the Loni inspections were conducted.
Key: Uses flying squads deployed with Magistrates, Police and the relevant State Pollution Control Board, so that inspection and punitive action including sealing happen in the same visit.
The legal concentration limits against which ambient air is judged - the yardstick both NCAP and GRAP work towards.
Key: The standards in force were notified by CPCB on 18 November 2009 and cover 12 pollutants, among them PM10, PM2.5, sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide, ozone, lead, benzene, arsenic and nickel. The 2009 revision lowered permissible limits and made the standards uniform across the country.
Particulate matter finer than 2.5 micrometres penetrates deep into the lungs and bloodstream, which is why it carries a separate and stricter standard than PM10. Unregulated furnaces burning wood and coal without air pollution control devices are direct PM2.5 sources, so 14 units on unapproved fuel in one small industrial cluster is a health story, not merely a paperwork one.
The reason 21 CTO violations matter more than they sound is that consent is the point at which a regulator can attach conditions - permitted fuel, stack height, control devices. A unit operating without consent has escaped the entire regime, which leaves sealing as the only remaining lever.
EPCA was created by the Environment Ministry on Supreme Court directions under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 and had no dedicated statute or permanent enforcement machinery. CAQM's 2021 Act gave the successor body its own law, a full-time chairperson and the powers exercised in drives such as this one.
GS Paper 3 > Environment > Environmental pollution and degradation; GS Paper 2 > Governance > Statutory, regulatory and quasi-judicial bodies
General Awareness > Environment and government bodies
General Awareness > Environment and Indian legislation
Delhi-NCR air pollution, CAQM, GRAP and NCAP appear almost every year in Prelims and in GS Paper 3; the statutory-versus-executive distinction is the recurring hook.
Permission required under Section 21 of the Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1981 before an industrial plant may operate in an air pollution control area; granted by the State Pollution Control Board.
Equipment such as scrubbers, bag filters or electrostatic precipitators fitted to a furnace or process to capture pollutants before they leave the stack. Eight units in this drive ran furnaces without them.
Pre-notified emergency measures for Delhi-NCR that escalate through four stages tied to AQI bands, in force since 2017 and implemented by CAQM since 2021.
A city that failed to meet the National Ambient Air Quality Standards over a specified period; such cities, together with million-plus cities, make up the 131 cities under NCAP.
A mobile inspection team deployed by CAQM, typically with Magistrates, Police and State Pollution Control Board officials, so that inspection and punitive action occur in a single visit.