Visibility over Delhi and further away
 

On my recent trip to India, I had my camera ready to snap a aerial pictures of Delhi. I couldn't because of poor visibility. I thought it might be smog but it extended far beyond (Delhi - Patna route).
While arriving Delhi on the last day, the visibility was a bit better but the pictures still show tall buildings rising out of smoke :sad:

I am a PPL-trainee, and it made me wonder how normal is this. I am not discussing the environmental pollution, but just interested in knowing if pilots are allowed VFR flights (e.g. training pilots) in these conditions.

Normal for this time of year, in India you get maybe a month of clear blue perfect CAVOK days in the north and north east, special VFR is the norm and thats only available to flight schools and helicopters. You might see viz around 3000 m often but 5km or more isnt so often. Jan and feb are the worse months in Delhi, but this viz is pretty much the whole top centre portion of India extending over to Kolkata and down into say Nagpur. South India and over in the west see clear skies a lot, in the south its especially nice and normal with lots of days of unlimited viz. Sadly in Delhi and Kolkata way too much pollution from industry, people and old diesel vehicles sadly in India.

All of the above mentioned factors, plus I suspect a low level shallow inversion would aggravate the smog conditions.

I can imagine that flying over south would be wonderful. I still have good memories from our Kerala trip, which was not so long back.

How about flying VFR over Rajsthan? It should be pretty interesting considering stretching desert with forts dotted across the region.

IIRC just after the monsoon season visibility gets better - plus it's lush green everywhere