The Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) has set up an integrated digital command and control centre aimed at strengthening real-time air pollution monitoring, tracking compliance and coordinating enforcement across the Delhi-NCR region.
The platform, PAVAN (Platform for Air Quality Vigilance and Analytics for NCR), brings together pollution-related data from multiple agencies and sectors on a single digital interface to help authorities identify pollution sources, detect violations, and take timely corrective action. It integrates more than 30 application programming interfaces (APIs) and data sources, including information from 111 Continuous Ambient Air Quality Monitoring Stations (CAAQMS), over 2,300 industries, more than 3,200 active construction sites and traffic hotspots.
Union Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav who visited the centre on Friday and said, “Clean air cannot be secured by any one agency or any one State acting alone. The command centre brings every data stream that matters onto a single screen, so that a farm fire, a polluting stack or an uncovered construction site is seen, flagged and acted upon in real time. The non-conforming industries, non-compliant polluting sources and traffic congestion hotspots would be swiftly acted upon due to the PAVAN I3C platform. Construction and demolition (C&D) activities across the NCR region would be halted from November 5 to 20 in a bid to control pollution.”
The system combines real-time and historical data to identify pollution trends, assess the effectiveness of mitigation measures and monitor compliance with prescribed standards and action plans.
CAQM also plans to integrate Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools to speed up data analysis and improve the identification of pollution patterns and potential violations.
The command centre monitors several key sources of air pollution, including crop residue burning, construction and demolition activities, vehicular emissions, industrial pollution, road dust and landfill management.
For monitoring crop residue burning, the platform uses satellite-based fire detection data from the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and Fire Information for Resource Management System (FIRMS). It also compares the data with the previous six years to assess seasonal trends.
Construction and demolition activities are monitored through live camera feeds and particulate matter (PM) sensors to track dust-generating activities and compliance with pollution-control measures. Similarly, live camera feeds from landfill sites at Okhla, Bhalswa, Ghazipur, Greater Noida and Bhandwari are used to identify activities requiring intervention.
In addition, PAVAN monitors citizen complaints received through the Green Delhi and SAMEER apps, including the action taken by concerned agencies and the status of grievance resolution.
It also tracks the deployment and movement of Mechanical Road Sweeping Machines (MRSMs) across municipal corporations in Delhi-NCR.
The system has an automated alert mechanism to flag deviations from prescribed norms, statutory directions and compliance requirements. Such alerts are escalated to the concerned implementing agencies for timely corrective action.
It will also track the implementation of State Action Plans across Delhi, Haryana, Punjab, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. The monitoring covers air quality, crop residue management, vehicular pollution, construction and demolition activities, road dust, municipal solid waste, industrial pollution, diesel generator sets and green crematoria.
