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From Delhi and Gurugram to Ahmedabad and Agra, 25 Indian cities make it to list of 50 most polluted cities in the world

A study by Greenpeace listing the most polluted cities in the world has found that of the 50 top cities on the list, 25 are Indian. Worse, there are seven Indian cities in the Top 10. This indicates the continuous and sharp decline in the air quality of major cities in the country.

Accounting for the worst air quality and topping the global list is Gurugram, with an average AIQ of 135.80 and 2.5PM.

These figures explain the adverse effects on the overall health of the residents.

Apart from this, the trends in the index suggest that cities in Northern India are more polluted than cities in other parts of the country. Apart from Gurugram, the other Indian cities in the Top 10 are Ghaziabad (2), Faridabad (4), Bhiwadi (5), Noida (6), Patna (7) and Lucknow (9).



Of India's metros, Delhi makes it to the list at No. 11 and Kolkata at No. 23. Mumbai, Chennai and Bengaluru don't make it to the list at all. However, there is bad news for residents of Ahmedabad, which ranks at No. 29.

The average AIQ in the cities and the Greenpeace report marks them as 'very unhealthy'. Since 2017, the countries mentioned have always been in the 'unhealthy for sensitive groups', 'unhealthy' and now, 'very unhealthy' categories.

Jaipur (37), Asansol (44) and Howrah (45) round up the Indian cities on the list.

Apart from the Indian cities, the list includes 22 cities of China, two cities of Pakistan (Faisalabad at 3 and Lahore at 10) and one city of Bangladesh (Dhaka at 17).

Yeb Sano, Executive Director of Greenpeace Southeast Asia, said in a statement released with the figures, “This has enormous impact on our health and on our wallets. In addition to human lives lost, there’s an estimated cost of USD 225 billion in lost labour, and trillions in medical costs.”

Here's the complete list of most polluted cities in the world:

1 Gurugram, India | 2 Ghaziabad, India | 3 Faisalabad, Pakistan | 4 Faridabad, India | 5 Bhiwadi, India | 6 Noida, India | 7 Patna, India | 8
Hotan, China | 9 Lucknow, India | 10 Lahore, Pakistan | 11 Delhi, India
12 Jodhpur, India | 13 Muzaffarpur, India | 14 Varanasi, India | 15 Moradabad, India | 16 Agra, India |
17 Dhaka, Bangladesh | 18 Gaya, India | 19 Kashgar, China | 20 Jind, India | 21 Kanpur, India | 22 Singrauli, India | 23 Kolkata, India | 24 Pali, India | 25 Rohtak, India | 26 Mandi Gobindgarh, India | 27 Xingtai Shi, China | 28 Shijiazhuang, China | 29 Ahmedabad, India | 30 Aksu, China | 31 Handan, China | 32 Anyang, China | 33
Baoding, China | 34 Linfen, China | 35 Wujiaqu, China | 36 Xianyang, China | 37 Jaipur, India | 38 Jiaozuo, China | 39 Hengshui Shi, China | 40 Xuzhou, China | 41 Cangzhou Shi, China | 42 Pingdingshan, China | 43 Kaifeng, China | 44 Asansol, India | 45 Howrah, India | 46 Xuchang, China | 47 Zhengzhou, China | 48 Tangshan, China | 49 Puyang, China | 50 Luohe, China.

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