Supreme Court has orally observed that the measures taken by authorities so far have been a “total failure” in effectively curbing the rising levels of air pollution in the Delhi–NCR region. A Bench led by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant remarked that any meaningful reduction in pollution would require broader and long-term planning rather than ad-hoc responses. With respect to various petitions highlighting the inadequacy of recent measures aimed at protecting children, such as the Delhi government’s directives to shut schools or allow them to function in a hybrid mode, the Court noted that these were merely temporary policy decisions taken by the authorities to mitigate health risks. Thus, the bench refused to interfere with respect to the decision of Delhi government to direct shutting schools or hybrid model of schools. “The short-term measures are only to provide temporary protection to children and elderly persons. These are purely interim policy decisions. At best, they can be viewed as an extension of vacations, as schools are anyway scheduled to remain closed for 10 to 15 days during the winter,” the Court observed. Air pollution: Supreme Court says the air pollution crisis has become an annual feature, and a long term plan needs to be evolved by CAQM and given effect in phased manner. It asks CAQM to revisit its long term measures to deal with the air pollution issue.