Two air-purifying devices have been installed at two of the busiest traffic-intersections in Delhi in a bid to curb the alarming air pollution levels the Indian capital city normally battles with.

Environment Minister Harsh Vardhan inaugurated the air pollution control device "WAYU" (Wind Augmentation Purifying Unit) recently for traffic junctions at the ITO intersection and the Mukarba Chowk.

By Oct. 15, the ministry plans to install 54 more such devices at various such traffic intersections across Delhi where pollution levels are high, particularly during winter months. Winter normally sets in north India, including Delhi, in October and lasts till February.

The device has been jointly developed by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research and the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (CSIR-NEERI) as part of technology development project being funded by the country's department of science and technology.

After inaugurating the devices, the minister said that the indigenously developed prototype device has the capacity to purify air in an area of 500 square meters around it.

The device consumes only half a unit of electricity in 10 hours of running, and has a maintenance cost of only 1,500 Indian Rupees (around 21 U.S. dollars) per month.

"We are in the process of developing a bigger version of WAYU which can purify air in an area of 10,000 meter square and also the designs of future WAYU devices will have even better aesthetics and can be deployed in bus shelters etc," said the environment minister.

The device has one fan and filter for sucking and removing the "particulate matter". There are two ultra violet lamps and half kilogram of activated carbon charcoal coated with special chemical "titanium dioxide" to purify the surrounding air.