Published: 5 April 2026 | Author: Team JanVayu | Reading time: 4 min
In January 2019, India launched the National Clean Air Programme (NCAP) and promised to cut particulate matter by 20 to 30 percent across 131 cities by 2024, a goal later raised to 40 percent by 2025-26. Seven years on, CREA counts Rs 13,415 crore released under NCAP and Fifteenth Finance Commission grants together, of which Rs 9,929 crore had been used by January 2026, and the deadline has arrived. The results are mixed.
The scorecard
According to the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air's "Tracing the Hazy Air" progress reports and the government's own PRANA portal, only 51 of the 100 NCAP cities with adequate PM10 data (out of 130 cities; the programme was announced with 131, and CREA and the Environment Ministry's 2026 reply count 130) achieved the initial target of a 20 to 30 percent reduction in PM10 levels. When measured against the revised target of 40 percent, just 23 of those 100 cities made the cut, and 23 saw PM10 rise.
Some cities did well. Varanasi tops the list: PM2.5 fell 72 percent over five years, to an annual average of 26.9 micrograms per cubic metre in 2023. At least four other cities (Jodhpur, Kanpur, Meerut and Lucknow) cut PM2.5 by more than 40 percent between 2019 and 2023, as reported by The Hindu; that is a PM2.5 test, not the PM10 target NCAP sets.
Others went the wrong way. PM2.5 in Navi Mumbai rose by 46 percent between 2019 and 2023, and Ujjain's also rose by 46 percent. The two figures are identical in the source, which is The Hindu's report of 10 January 2024 on an analysis by Respirer Living Sciences and Climate Trends; it also gives Mumbai a 38.1 percent rise. In these cities the air got worse while the programme was running.
Where the money went
From 2019 to January 2026, CREA counts Rs 13,415 crore released by the central government under NCAP and Fifteenth Finance Commission (XV-FC) grants combined: Rs 2,395 crore from NCAP's own fund and Rs 11,021 crore in XV-FC grants for the million-plus cities. Of the total, 74 percent was used (Rs 9,929 crore). That is 59 percent of the NCAP fund (Rs 1,417 crore) and 77 percent of the XV-FC grants (Rs 8,513 crore). Cities received money they did not spend, and much of what they did spend went to one measure.
Of the money spent, 68 percent went to road dust (CREA 2026): water sprinkling, mechanical sweeping and road paving. Industry received less than 1 percent, domestic fuel measures less than 1 percent, and public outreach less than 1 percent. About two-thirds of the budget went on keeping roads damp and swept.
Road dust adds to PM10, but it is not the main source of PM2.5, the pollutant most closely linked to deaths. Fine particles come mostly from vehicle exhaust, industry, construction, waste burning and crop residue fires. The spending pattern favours measures people can see over measures that protect health.
The funding cliff
What comes next is less certain. Fifteenth Finance Commission grants to the 49 million-plus cities, under which Rs 11,021 crore was released, expired in March 2026. No successor mechanism has been announced. Update, 5 October 2026: the Sixteenth Finance Commission's report, laid on 1 February 2026, records the Environment Ministry's request to continue the air-quality grant. In the text we read, it makes no air-quality award of its own. See Delhi: NCAP, the action plans and this winter. The Fifteenth Commission amount is roughly 82 percent of the Rs 13,415 crore released across all NCAP and Finance Commission grants combined (CREA, Tracing the Hazy Air 2026).
Without a replacement, the 49 million-plus cities, which received about 82 percent of released funds (CREA 2026), lose their dedicated grant, and the NCAP funding window for all cities closed in FY2025-26. Cities that struggled to spend their money now have none to spend.
The funding figures quoted for NCAP do not form one series, so here is what each counts. CREA's January 2025 report counted Rs 11,211 crore released under NCAP and XV-FC grants together; its January 2026 report counts Rs 13,415 crore on the same two streams. On 23 July 2026 the Environment Ministry told the Rajya Sabha that Rs 16,423.56 crore, which it called an air quality performance-based incentive grant, had been released to targeted cities under NCAP from FY 2019-20 to 2025-26 (PIB). The reply does not say how that sum divides between NCAP's own fund and Finance Commission grants, and we have not reconciled it with CREA's count. On the amount used, the Ministry's reply in the Lok Sabha on 15 December 2025 (Unstarred Question 2339, tabulated by PRS) gives Rs 13,415 crore released and Rs 10,003 crore used, 75 percent, against CREA's Rs 9,929 crore and 74 percent. The released figure is identical. Neither source says why the used figure differs by Rs 74 crore.
A design problem
NCAP's target is PM10, and PM2.5 is the pollutant that matters most. PM10 includes coarse particles such as road dust, which harm health less. PM2.5, the fine particles that reach deep into the lungs and the bloodstream, is what kills people. A programme judged on PM10 can show progress by sweeping roads while the fine particles go on as before.
City action plans are advisory, and there is no penalty for missing them. Cities self-report their action and spending data on the PRANA portal (CSE, July 2024); air-quality trends are computed from CPCB's own monitors.
What would help
Varanasi suggests that sustained work across several sectors can succeed when political commitment is there. The programme as a whole shows what happens without it: funding with no accountability, aimed at the wrong pollutant and spent mostly on visible, low-impact measures gave modest results for over Rs 13,000 crore released (CREA 2026).
India does not need a new programme. The existing one should target PM2.5, enforce compliance, spend on more than road dust, and keep its funding past the Finance Commission cliff. The air quality data exists, and the health evidence is causal.