India, Nov. 10 -- Every year, as Diwali approaches, much of India finds itself wrapped in a grey blanket of smoke and smog. The festival of lights, which should bring joy with family and friends, is now marked by hazy mornings, stinging eyes, and a lingering cough that many have come to accept as 'normal' for the season. Firecrackers, vehicle fumes, construction dust, and crop burning also push air quality indices in many cities like Delhi NCR and Patna to alarmingly unsafe levels.

In clinics, we see sick people walk in every November with the same symptoms as the previous year's children wheezing, grandparents struggling to breathe, and adults who have smoked for years ignoring a cough that deserves attention. "As a pulmonologist, I wan...