Four Reasons Why Delhi's Green Cracker Initiative is Destined to Fail

New Delhi: Every year, Diwali leaves Delhi gasping for clean air. The morning after, the city is choked by a thick, toxic smog, with the Air Quality Index (AQI) routinely skyrocketing past the 500 mark; ten times the safe limit.

To solve this, the Supreme Court has stepped in with what seems like a perfect compromise: ban all old, polluting firecrackers, but allow the sale of new, "green crackers,” by permitting their use only for two hours in the evening and one hour in the morning for two days.

These crackers, developed by the government's own scientists (CSIR-NEERI), promise to reduce particulate matter emissions by up to 30%. On paper, it's a win-win. In reality, it's not. The plan to use green crackers is almost guaranteed to fail. Here are the four simple, real-world reasons why.

One: "If it's 'green,' I can use more!"

Think about "diet" soda or "low-fat" chips. Because we think they’re healthier, we often feel it's okay to have more of them. We end up consuming the same amount of calories, or sometimes even more.

The exact same thinking applies to green crackers. People will feel less guilty using them. A family that might have used one box of old crackers might now feel it’s fine to use two boxes of "green" ones. The 30% reduction in pollution is completely wiped out if the total number of crackers being burst goes up. In the end, the air can get just as dirty, or even worse.

Also read: Why Permitting ‘Green’ Diwali Crackers in Delhi Defies Logic – and Science

Two: The crackers are made 2,700 kms away

Here’s a fact that dooms the whole plan. Approximately 70% (7 out of 10 registered manufacturers) of all legal green crackers are made in and around Sivakasi, a town in Tamil Nadu. That's over 2,700 kms by road from Delhi.

Worse, there is only one licensed manufacturer in Delhi, 51 in Uttar Pradesh, and none in Haryana.

Getting enough trucks of crackers all the way to Delhi in time for the massive Diwali demand is a logistical nightmare. There will simply not be enough real green crackers available for everyone who wants to buy them. This leads directly to the next problem.

Three: The market will be flooded with fakes

When the real product is hard to find, fakes take over.

It is incredibly easy for a seller to take an old, illegal, highly-polluting cracker (containing banned chemicals like toxic barium nitrate) and slap a fake "green" sticker and a fake QR code on the box. As a buyer, you will have no way of knowing the difference.

You will likely pay extra, thinking you're doing the right thing for the environment. But in reality, you'll just be lighting the same old toxic cracker that has been choking Delhi for years.

Four: The rules are impossible to enforce

We’ve already seen that it’s very difficult for the police to stop people from bursting illegal crackers. It happened just a few weeks ago during Dussehra and Karwa Chauth festivals, when crackers were used despite a ban.

This isn't a new problem. A similar rule permitting only green crackers in 2018 was “widely flouted,” which prompted the National Green Tribunal to impose a complete ban just two years later in 2020.

Now, imagine this: If the police can't enforce a simple "no crackers" rule, how can they possibly check every single firecracker being sold on every street corner to see if it's a real green one or a fake? 

To conclude

The idea of a green cracker was a good try, but it's a solution that only works on paper, not in the real world. It ignores how people think, the reality of where crackers are made, the certainty of a black market for fakes, and the difficulty of enforcing the rules.

The hard truth is that the only truly clean cracker is the one that's never lit.

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