Low-emission fireworks a hit among customers

Neeraj Bagga

Amritsar, October 23

Low-emission fireworks free of harmful chemicals and producing minimum sound have become a favourite of customers this Diwali, say traders selling crackers in the retail market here on Sunday, a day before Diwali.

They are of the view that a majority of the manufacturers are preferring to display on the packaging of the firecrackers the information that these are green crackers and contain less pollutants and produce less noise.

Arpreet Singh, a trader, said highly polluting contents like sulphur nitrate, arsenic, magnesium, sodium, lead, antimony, lithium, mercury and barium are already prohibited in the making of fireworks. Similarly, in case of sound yield, conventional crackers used to emit anywhere between 160 decibels to even 200 decibels while green crackers were restricted to about 100-130 decibels.

Harish Dhawan, president of Amritsar Fireworks Association, said studies conducted by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research and National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (CSIR- NEERI) stated that contemporary fireworks produce 30 per cent less pollutants in comparison to conventional ones.

This time, the pollution emanating out of fireworks would be less as Sivakasi, hub of producing fireworks in the country, has halved its production from the previous years. This city in Tamil Nadu used to manufacture fireworks worth over Rs 6,000 crore.