With a little over 91 per cent of the total area under paddy in Punjab already harvested, the number of farm fires recorded till Jattvibeday touched 4,459. Coupled with cracker emissions, the farm fires have pushed three districts in the state into the ‘very poor’ air quality category.Punjab has over 32.87 lakh hectares under paddy, and farmers continue to set their fields on fire to prepare for sowing the winter crop, which is usually sown between November 15 and 30.Meanwhile, Punjab has imposed environmental compensation in 1,228 cases, in which farmers have been fined Rs 62.55 lakh. So far, Rs 32.60 lakh worth of compensation has been collected.On Monday, a day after Diwali, the AQI in Punjab districts stood at 201 in Patiala, 306 in Ludhiana, 274 in Khanna, 327 in Jalandhar, 382 in Mandi Gobindgarh and 244 in Amritsar.On Saturday, a day before Diwali, the AQI in these districts was 204 in Patiala, 222 in Ludhiana, 201 in Khanna, 205 in Jalandhar, 281 in Mandi Gobindgarh and 115 in Amritsar.The Tribune team visited some villages in Fatehgarh Sahib, Khanna, Ludhiana, Patiala, Sangrur, Malerkotla and Mohali, where crackers continued to pollute the air till the wee hours of Monday. The two-hour window for bursting crackers allowed by the government went for a toss, and police registered cases mostly against unidentified persons.According to official data, five of the six districts in Punjab where air quality is monitored now fall in the ‘poor’ or ‘very poor’ categories following cracker emissions and a spike in farm fires, besides other factors.As per the air quality standards set by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, air quality is categorised as good (0-50), satisfactory (51-100), moderately polluted (101-200), poor (201-300), very poor (301-400) and severe (401-500).As farmers step up the burning of crop residue in Punjab’s hinterland, an increasing number of elderly people and children from villages are visiting doctors these days, complaining of sore throats, fever, eye irritation and other ailments due to smoke emanating from farm fires.