India’s novel attempts at battling deadly air pollution are falling short

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Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. NEW DELHI—As the skies turned hazy with pollution this winter, a giant outdoor purifier sat dormant in the Indian capital’s central business district. The smog tower, lined with double rows of fans, was intended to purify the surrounding area by sucking in smog, passing it through filters on the inside and releasing clean air.

But the red-and-lime green contraption hasn’t worked for over a year. “That’s so stupid," said college student Suhani Shrivastava, gesturing toward the tower as she walked by. “It doesn’t work and it doesn’t make any sense." The 19-year-old said she is sick every winter with congested lungs and a sore throat.

She blames the government for what she says is wasting taxpayer money on useless tools that don’t make a dent in the toxic air that afflicts one of the world’s most polluted cities. “I feel like I’m taking in cancer," she said, between bouts of coughing. “It’s like the government has given up.

They don’t care." Delhi’s air quality declines sharply starting each October as farmers to the west of the capital set fires to clear crop stubble from their fields. Winds carry those particles to the city where they mix with emissions from vehicles, power plants and factories. Cooler temperatures prevent the polluted air from dispersing as it does in summer.

Experts said that government efforts to combat pollution, often announced with fanfare as winter approaches, have been ineffective and at times, downright silly. The ruling party in Delhi, the Aam Aadmi Party, has deployed drones to monitor pollution hot spots and 200 mobile “antismog guns," which are vehicles mounted with water cannons that drive around the city misting the air. The idea is that the spray