Abstract

COVID-19 being a respiratory trouble is adversely influenced by increasing air pollution. People with pre-existing medical conditions,
particularly respiratory illness, are prone to the COVID-19 virus. Ambient air pollution weakens the immune system and also facilitates
the spread of the virus as it gets adsorbed on the particulate matter. Diwali festivals falling at the onset of winters have proven to
deteriorate the air pollution levels owing to longer retention time of the pollutants in winters. This study correlates the SO2 and
NO2 measurements with daily COVID-19 deaths during the first two waves of the pandemic and assesses the air quality variations
monitored during the Diwali period in 2019 and 2020 with respect to the gaseous pollutants viz NO2 and SO2 in the cities of Delhi
and Lucknow. The AQI values recorded for Diwali 2020 were observed to be higher than the previous years’ values in general and no
strong correlation was observed to have been established between the COVID mortality cases and focused gaseous pollutants.