Fireworks Regulatory Bodies in India
Who regulates firecrackers in India — PESO, CPCB, CSIR-NEERI, the Supreme Court and state pollution boards — and what each one actually controls.
Fireworks Regulatory Bodies in India
Last verified: 2026
No single agency runs firecrackers in India. A manufacturer needs a PESO licence to make one, CSIR-NEERI's formula and QR code to call it "green," the Supreme Court's 2018 framework and noise ceiling to sell it legally anywhere in the country, and, depending on the city, a state pollution control board's air-quality trigger or an NGT order to actually burst it that night. Five bodies, five different jobs, and buyers who only ever hear "banned" or "green cracker" rarely know which one made that call. This page sorts out who controls what.
Short answer:
- PESO (Petroleum and Explosives Safety Organisation) licenses manufacturers and certifies formulations under the Explosives Act, 1884 and the Explosives Rules, 2008: the gate a cracker must clear before it can legally be made at all.
- CSIR-NEERI developed the green-cracker formulations (SWAS, STAR, SAFAL) and certifies which products may carry the green logo and QR code.
- CPCB (Central Pollution Control Board) sets the national noise standard, 125 dB(AI)/145 dB(C) pk at 4 metres, under the Noise Pollution (Regulation and Control) Rules, 2000, and coordinates Diwali-season air and noise monitoring with the states.
- The Supreme Court, through its 23 October 2018 judgment in Arjun Gopal v. Union of India (WP(C) 728/2015), is the body that turned green-cracker-only, the noise ceiling and the e-commerce ban into binding, nationwide law.
- State Pollution Control Boards and the National Green Tribunal handle the local and seasonal layer: testing and seizing non-compliant stock, and imposing air-quality-triggered green-only or full bans on top of the national framework.
On this page
On this page
For the definitions these bodies regulate, see the firecracker encyclopedia and green cracker certification marks; for what's actually legal to buy and burst where you live, see firecracker laws in India and Supreme Court rules on crackers.
PESO: who licenses the manufacturer
The Petroleum and Explosives Safety Organisation is the central government body a fireworks unit answers to before it can legally exist. Operating under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, headquartered in Nagpur with regional offices across the country, PESO enforces the Explosives Act, 1884 and the Explosives Rules, 2008: the licensing framework under which a manufacturer applies for approvals (forms such as LE-1, LE-3 and LE-5) to make, store and sell explosive-based products, fireworks included. PESO's role sits upstream of everything else on this page: it tests and licenses the formulation and the factory before a single box reaches a shop shelf. The 2018 Supreme Court judgment layered a further duty onto PESO directly: inspecting and certifying that firecracker composition meets the post-2018 standard (no barium, the approved chemical list, the noise ceiling) before manufacture is permitted, and the October 2025 NCR relaxation order went further still, restricting that window's sale to manufacturers holding both NEERI registration and a PESO licence together.
CSIR-NEERI: who certifies "green"
The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research's National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (CSIR-NEERI) answers a different question from PESO's: not "is this legal to make," but "does this formulation pollute less." NEERI developed the SWAS (Safe Water Releaser), STAR (Safe Thermite Cracker) and SAFAL (Safe Minimal Aluminium) green-cracker formulations and is the certifying authority for the green logo and QR code a genuine green cracker carries. Its role is technical and formulation-specific, not a licence to manufacture: a producer still needs PESO approval on top of NEERI's green certification. The full comparison of what SWAS, STAR and SAFAL each mean, and how to read the QR code, is on green cracker certification marks.
CPCB: who sets the noise and pollution standard
The Central Pollution Control Board, under the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, sets the national environmental standard a cracker is measured against, most visibly on noise. Under the Noise Pollution (Regulation and Control) Rules, 2000, CPCB's standard caps firecracker noise at 125 dB(AI) or 145 dB(C) peak, measured 4 metres from the point of bursting, the same ceiling the Supreme Court later wrote into binding law in 2018. CPCB recommends manufacturers get formulations tested annually at an authorised laboratory such as CSIR-National Physical Laboratory before claiming compliance, and it runs coordinated air- and noise-monitoring with the State Pollution Control Boards through the Diwali period, publishing city-wise pre- and post-festival readings each year. CPCB sets the yardstick; it's the states and the courts that apply it on the ground.
The Supreme Court: who made it binding law
Everything above (PESO's licensing, NEERI's green formula, CPCB's 125 dB standard) existed in some form before 2018. What the Supreme Court did, in its 23 October 2018 judgment in Arjun Gopal v. Union of India (WP(C) 728/2015), was fuse them into one binding, nationwide framework: only certified green crackers may be manufactured and sold, a named list of chemicals including barium is banned outright, joined or series crackers are banned, e-commerce sale of firecrackers is banned nationwide, and the 125 dB(AI)/145 dB(C) pk ceiling became a legal limit rather than a recommendation. That judgment sits inside a single case file the Court has returned to repeatedly since, most recently on 15 October 2025, when it temporarily relaxed the standing NCR restriction for a narrow, closely monitored window. The full year-by-year record of every order in that case is on Supreme Court rules on crackers.
State Pollution Control Boards and the NGT: who enforces it locally
Two bodies apply the national framework at the state and city level, and they're often confused for each other.
State Pollution Control Boards (Karnataka's KSPCB, West Bengal's WBPCB, and their counterparts elsewhere) are the enforcement arm on the ground: monitoring local air quality, coordinating with district administration and police to check dealer stock, and, alongside PESO, testing samples of crackers claiming to be "green" to catch spurious or mislabelled products before or during the festival season. A state board's notification is why bursting hours or a green-only mandate can differ from one city to the next even though the underlying Supreme Court order is the same nationwide.
The National Green Tribunal is a separate judicial body from the Supreme Court, not a pollution board, and it added its own air-quality-triggered layer on top of the 2018 framework starting in late 2020. By orders dated 9 November and 1 December 2020 (O.A. No. 249/2020), the NGT restricted firecracker use to green crackers only, for no more than two hours, in any city or town recording moderate-or-worse air quality, and banned crackers outright in cities recording poor-or-worse air quality. It has since expanded that scrutiny beyond the National Capital Region, issuing notices to states and union territories with non-compliant air quality. In practice: the Supreme Court set the baseline law; the NGT decides, air-quality reading by air-quality reading, when a city drops below the line where even green crackers aren't permitted.
Who controls what: a quick reference
| Body | What it controls | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| PESO | Manufacturer licensing, factory and formulation approval | Explosives Act, 1884; Explosives Rules, 2008 |
| CSIR-NEERI | Green-cracker formulation (SWAS/STAR/SAFAL) and certification | Developed under CSIR; certifying authority since 2018 framework |
| CPCB | National noise/pollution standard (125 dB(AI)/145 dB(C) pk @ 4m); Diwali monitoring | Noise Pollution (Regulation and Control) Rules, 2000 |
| Supreme Court of India | Binding nationwide rules: green-only, chemical bans, noise ceiling, e-commerce ban | WP(C) 728/2015, judgment 23 Oct 2018 and subsequent orders |
| State Pollution Control Boards | Local enforcement, dealer/stock testing, air-quality monitoring | State-level notifications under the national framework |
| National Green Tribunal | Air-quality-triggered green-only or full bans, city by city | O.A. No. 249/2020, orders 9 Nov & 1 Dec 2020 and later |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is PESO the same as CPCB?
No. PESO licenses manufacturers and certifies that a formulation is safe to make, under the Explosives Act and Rules. CPCB sets the environmental standard (most visibly the 125 dB noise ceiling) under the Noise Pollution Rules, 2000, and monitors pollution levels. One is a manufacturing-safety regulator; the other is an environmental-standards body.
Does CSIR-NEERI decide whether crackers are legal to sell?
No. NEERI certifies whether a formulation qualifies as "green" and may carry its logo and QR code. Legality to sell still requires a PESO manufacturing licence and compliance with the Supreme Court's 2018 framework; NEERI's certification is one input into that, not the whole licence.
What's the difference between the Supreme Court's rules and an NGT order?
The Supreme Court's 23 October 2018 judgment set the binding, nationwide baseline: green crackers only, banned chemicals, the noise ceiling, no e-commerce sale. The National Green Tribunal is a separate tribunal that adds a further, air-quality-triggered layer on top of that baseline, restricting or banning even green crackers in specific cities when recorded air quality is moderate or worse, city by city and season by season.
Who actually checks whether a shop is selling a genuine green cracker?
State Pollution Control Boards, working with PESO, are responsible for testing and seizing crackers that falsely claim green certification, sampling stock at the district level and checking the QR code and formulation against NEERI's approved list. This is separate from the national rules the Supreme Court and CPCB set; it's the on-the-ground enforcement layer.
Which body sets the noise limit crackers must stay under?
CPCB set the 125 dB(AI)/145 dB(C) pk-at-4-metres standard under the Noise Pollution (Regulation and Control) Rules, 2000. The Supreme Court's 23 October 2018 judgment then wrote that same figure into binding nationwide law, which is why the limit is usually cited as a Supreme Court rule even though CPCB set the underlying standard.
Read the full firecracker laws in India explainer for what's legal where you live, the Supreme Court rules on crackers timeline for how this framework was built order by order, or start at the firecracker encyclopedia for the terms these bodies regulate.
Written by the buyonlinecrackers.com editorial team. Reviewed for accuracy against PESO, CPCB, CSIR-NEERI, Supreme Court of India and National Green Tribunal sources current as of 2026.
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