As the festival of Diwali and winter season draw near, Delhi-NCR is gearing up to meet the severe air quality challenge that it faces every year around this time. A Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) has been notified and is already in place – and October 17, 2017 is the day from when Very Poor and Severe categories of GRAP will be imposed till March 15, 2018. This was announced in a press conference by the Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority (EPCA), the committee constituted by the Central government following orders passed by the Supreme Court of India in 1998.