Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday asked state governments and other agencies to take the issue of stubble burning seriously after national capital’s air quality hit the “very poor” category on Tuesday morning, the first time since February.

Kejriwal said while farmers of neighbouring states and people of Delhi are bearing the brunt of stubble burning, “governments have shut their eyes.”

Stubble burning has been one of the major cause of pollution in the Delhi-NCR during winter, and degrades the air quality in the region.

“While the farmers of neighbouring states and the people of Delhi are bearing the brunt of stubble burning, governments have shut their eyes. I hope that they take concrete steps so that the entire north India gets rid of high levels of air pollution,” he said.

“State governments should stop blaming each other. We have to work together to find a solution to the issue… All agencies and governments need to take it seriously now,” he was quoted by PTI as saying.

Kejriwal was speaking at the Hiranki village in Narela, where the spraying of Pusa bio-decomposer solution started on Tuesday.

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According to experts quoted by PTI, the solution can prevent stubble burning by turning it into manure within 15 to 20 days.

Kejriwal said that if the Delhi government can make efforts to prevent stubble burning, so can other state governments.

“When the process was in its initial phase, I made attempts to contact the Central government and if they wanted, they could have worked with us to address the issue,” he said.

“We got to know about the technology developed by the Pusa Institute in September, and so did they. We have to work together with sincerity,” he said.

The AAP leader said that he was worried about the farm fires in the neighbouring states.

“The smoke has started affecting Delhi’s air quality…Air pollution was under control for the last 10 months, but it has started increasing again,” he said.

“Imagine the impact of stubble burning on the families of farmers who have no option but to burn the crop residue. Farmers don’t burn it willfully,” Kejriwal was quoted as saying.