Report says Beil stored much higher quantity of waste than permitted, ignored notice on its safety standards

Ankleshwar, Gujarat: Initial investigations into a fire at an inflammable toxic waste treatment plant in Ankleshwar, Gujarat, show that the facility’s operator had ignored notices and warnings issued a month earlier by state authorities. The district collector of Bharuch, where Ankleshwar is located, has decided to initiate criminal procedings against company officials.

A three-member committee, comprising an official of the Gujarat Pollution Control Board, or GPCB, a sub-judicial magistrate and a factory inspector, set up immediately after the 3 April fire, has said in its report that it found irregularities at the facility run by Bharuch Enviro Infrastructure Ltd, or Beil.

“The report has clear findings that Beil stored hazardous waste in much higher quantity (than permitted), dumped hazardous waste in a haphazard manner and did not have adequate fire or safety equipment to deal with such a situation,” said GPCB official V.R. Ghatge, who was part of the three-member panel.

GPCB and the factory inspector had in March issued a notice to Beil on its safety standards and high inventory. “It does not appear to have made any difference to Beil,” Ghatge said.

According to the GPCB official, the capacity allowed for Beil was 2.5 tonnes per hour and the firm could keep an inventory of 90 days. This means Beil could store solid toxic waste of up to 5,400 tonnes. Instead, it had kept 12,000 tonnes of solid toxic waste.

Bharuch district collector Arti Kanwar said local authorities would not take any “knee-jerk” action against the facility although they plan to initiate criminal litigation against company officials.

“The criminal proceedings will not be under the Indian Penal Code but under the Factories Act and Environment Protection Act. The provisions under these Acts involve imprisonment of up to five years and fine of up to Rs1 lakh. We are planning some more measures and will file more cases against the company in the near future,” she said.

Beil director Ashok Panjwani said he has not received any notice from the government but “we are prepared to answer any legal questions.” The firm has set up a five-member team to study reasons for the fire and steps it should take to ensure safety. “We will follow the instructions given by the government and try to change accordingly,” Panjwani said.

Regarding the immediate impact of the fire on the lives of people in the area, the collector said authorities had not found any unwarranted traces of toxicity in the region so far.

“We have monitored the area for air pollution or health hazards post fire. We did a door-to-door survey...in the villages surrounding the site and have not found any impact. We would periodically continue to monitor the situation,” Kanwar said.

Pradip Thaker, regional secretary of not-for-profit organization Human Welfare, Environment and Safety Association, or HWESA, disagreed. “An incinerator involves burning the toxic waste at a temperature of 1,200 degrees centigrade (Celsius) for safety. The fire reached a level of 400 degrees centigrade only. So, there is bound to be some toxic waste and heavy chemicals that would have gone into the air and it needs to be studied in detail.”

Thaker said that it rained within 24 hours of the fire and toxic particles might have settled on the farms in the vicinity. Moreover, over 150 water tankers were deployed to douse the fire. “The water was poured on the toxic substance. It has surely gone underground and needs to be looked at,” he said.

HWESA has been campaigning in the area against bringing solid waste from the Union Carbide factory in Bhopal for incineration to Beil. “They cannot handle solid waste from the (local) industry. Imagine if something of this sort happened while handling Bhopal waste.”

The area, consisting of three main industrial clusters of Ankleshwar, Jhagadia and Panoli, houses over 700 industrial units that produce pharmaceuticals and chemicals for varied use across the globe.

At the industrial town of 200,000 citizens, nothing seemed to have changed. “There was too much excitement on the night of fire and a lot of worry about safety, but now it is business as usual,” said Ramnikbhai Kapadia, a shopkeeper on station road, adjacent to Gujarat Industrial Development Corp.’s industrial estate that houses a large number of chemical units.

But there are others, such as Ranjitbhai, who said they were lucky because of “favourable” winds. “The storage site of Beil was apparently holding more than 11,000 drums of toxic waste and the fire happened only in one of the sheds. As the wind direction was away from storage site and towards empty farms, a bigger disaster was averted,” he said, adding that the city may not be so lucky next time.

Kanwar said the government was not immediately looking at closing down the facility. “If we ask for closure, we would be encouraging industrial units to dump toxic waste (indiscriminately). We do not want that.”

It is illegal for industries to store more than 10 tonnes of toxic waste. They have to send the excess for incineration.

“I could not tell the industry that I would not take their waste and so I took it. I had kept concerned authorities informed of this situation,” Panjwani said. He also said that closing the incinerator was not a solution and neither was his company thinking about it. “It is not like closing an industrial unit. If I close down, there is no similar facility in the region. More than 500 units would therefore forced to close down. A fire is not the end of the world. We just need to learn from it for the future.”

Kamlesh Udani, director of J.B. Pharmaceuticals Ltd, which has a bulk drug unit in the area, said the incinerator must continue to operate. “There are some big companies in the area that have small incinerators but small units are completely dependent on this incinerator. You now need to ensure that safety is observed more strictly,” he said.

A massive fire that consumed 120 tonne of unknown toxic wastes at Bharuch Environ Infrastructure's (BEIL) toxic waste treatment and storage facility in Ankleshwar, Gujarat on April 3 has triggered calls from the survivors of the Bhopal Union Carbide gas disaster of 1980 against dumping the carbide waste anywhere in India.

Of the 8,000 tonne of waste which lay buried in the carbide site in Bhopal, 345 tonne of toxic waste was to be removed to Ankleshwar for incineration as per Madhya Pradesh High Court orders.

P M Bhargava – a member of the High Court appointed technical committee - who had advised the Madhya Pradesh High Court against sending Union Carbide's waste from Bhopal for incineration at this facility today said that the fire underlined the gist of their warnings against dumping carbide waste in Ankleshwar or anywhere in India.

The technical committee has in fact recommended disposal of the waste in the US which has facilities for destroying the toxins of the carbide plant.

Rohit Prajapati of Gujarat-based Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti said at a press conference: "The fire disaster in Ankleshwar was handled very poorly. Till date no information has been made available to the public regarding what was burnt in the fire, what is stored on site, and what to do in the event of a disaster."

According to Prajapati, this is both against the law and counter to the lessons learnt from the Bhopal disaster. Prajapati was part of a 4-person civil society team that visited Ankleshwar to ascertain the situation after the fire disaster.

The Environmental Protection Act and the Factories Act mandate disclosure of information relating to hazards posed by chemicals to workers and public. However, Gujarat Pollution Control Board refused to divulge this information even under Right to Information, Prajapati said.

The pollution was so intense that three villages were to be evacuated according to early news reports. However, no evacuation happened as the District Administration neither had an evacuation plan nor a disaster management plan.

New Delhi, Apr 8: A Bhopal gas tragedy-like disaster was averted in Gujarat's Ankeleshwar earlier this month, an NGO claimed today.

Gujarat-based Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti said here that a fire consumed 120 tonnes of unknown toxic waste on April three at Bharuch Environ Infrastructure Ltd (BEIL's) toxic waste storage and disposal facility in Ankeleshwar. ''The incident vindicates the stance of local residents, Bhopal survivors and a member of the High Court appointed Technical Committee who had advised the Madhya Pradesh High Court against sending Union Carbide's waste from Bhopal for incineration at the BEIL facility,'' said Samiti's Rohit Prajapati.

The Samiti members sat on a dharna at Jantar Matar here with Bhopal survivors who have just completed a padyatra to the National Capital.

He alleged that while the Environmental Protection Act and the Factories Protection Act mandates disclosure of information relating to hazards posed by chemicals to workers ad residents, the Gujarat Poccution Control Board refused to divulge the information on the type of toxic which caught fire in the incident under the Right to Information Act.

A Task Force set up by the Madhya Pradesh HC to recommend action on toxic waste lyinging and around the Union Carbide factory site in Bhopal concuded that 345 tonne of chlorinated wastes should be sent to BEIL for incineration. ''But according to Dr P M Bhargava, a prominent scientist and member of the Technical Committee appointed by the HC, the Task Force had omitted parts of the Technical Sub-committee report that strongly suggested that the waste be shipped back to Dow Chemicals for disposal in the United States,'' claimed Prajapati.

He also charged the Narendra Modi government in Gujarat with not taking steps to avoid the transfer of the Union Carbide chemicals to BEIL as it was concerned about the capital investment promised by Dow Chemicals in the state.

The district administration in Ankeleshwar had no contingency plans to tackle such incidents, he claimed.

Prajapati also quoted a study by a German consultant which found that the BEIL facility was not equipped to deal with highly toxic wastes.

Now, at last, MP authorities should recognise that the only possible destination for Dow's toxic wastes is the home of the finest international disposal standards, namely, the seat of Dow's business - the USA. Ed.

Devastating Indian Chemical Fire Under Control

Epoch Times, April 4th, 2008

After nine hours, firefighters finally brought a devastating fire under control in western India. The fire broke out at a chemical factory in India's western Gujarat Province.

The fire was on the property of the Bharuch Enviro Infrastructure factory. The cause of the fire is still unknown.

BEIL: meeting their own 'international standards'

Divisional Fire Officer R. M. Gamit told reporters, "The chemical waste from the factory was kept in a storage warehouse for disposal … We are still trying to ascertain the reasons behind the outbreak of the fire."

Authorities put three villages in the vicinity on high alert. Disaster management officials have also installed devices in the surrounding area to measure damage to the environment. No casualties have been reported so far.

Divisional Fire Officer R. M. Gamit said the cause of the fire is not yet known. (NTDTV)"That fire is now under control," said District Magistrate Anita Kanwar. "We had taken precautions regarding emissions from the fire in the surrounding villages. However, we did not need to evacuate any village. We had kept medical teams there on standby and they will continue to be there to keep the locals under observation."

The huge fire at BEIL

Fire safety laws are lax in India. Many factories in congested urban areas allegedly handle hazardous material carelessly.

BHOPAL: The Gujarat government has refused to allow disposal of toxic waste from the abandoned Union Carbide plant at the incinerator facility in Ankleshwar, according to copies of letters from the Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB) and the State’s Department of Forest and Environment.

This was highlighted at a press conference here on Sunday by representatives of four people’s organisations working among the victims of the 1984 Union Carbide gas disaster. Mediapersons were jointly addressed by Satinath Sarangi and Rachna Dhingra of Bhopal Group for Information & Action, Syed M. Irfan of Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Purush Sangharsh Morcha and Rashida Bi of Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Stationery Karmachari Sangh.

Copies of the letters were circulated among journalists. These were obtained using the Right to Information Act.

“Feigning ignorance”

Mr. Sarangi said the Madhya Pradesh government continued to feign ignorance in this regard and was trying to cover up its failure to find a facility within the country that would accept Bhopal’s hazardous waste for disposal.

The letters refer to “opposition from various NGOs and representatives of public” and categorically state that the Madhya Pradesh government must carry out “disposal of the waste elsewhere.”

Mr. Sarangi said that safe disposal of the toxic waste was not possible in India, and Gujarat’s refusal to handle it proved this point.

The leaders heading the people’s organisations reiterated their demand that the government should force Dow Chemical to clean up and ship the toxic waste to some facility in the United States just as the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board forced Unilever in 2003 to ship its mercury waste from its thermometer factory in Kodaikanal to the United States for treatment and disposal.

The organisations also presented copies of correspondence between the Madhya Pradesh Pollution Control Board (MPPCB) and the Union Carbide to show that in 1991 the Board recommended export of toxic waste.

Drawing attention to the massive exposure of residents near the Union Carbide plant site to toxic dust during the packaging of the waste in June 2005, the activists expressed apprehension that the Bhopal residents and those on the route of the trucks carrying the waste would once again suffer health hazards.

Regardless of the fact that Carbide is implicated in management of waste in Bhopal AFTER 1989 when the Hazardous Waste & Management Rules were introduced, Mr Dubey appears so keen to please Dow reps that he omits to mention that Article 21 of the Indian Constitution guarantees everyone the right to life, and that the Supreme Court has interpreted this in the following way: "environmental, ecological, air, water, pollution etc should be regarded as amounting to a violation of Article 21."

Nevertheless, the main purpose of the following article is to allege that survivors' organisations - with their desire for a full, safe clean-up, paid for by Dow and in accordance with international standards - are the only fetter to getting the contamination out of the way. We wonder whether Dow pay full PR industry rates for such sterling services?

Shashikant Trivedi, Business Standard, November 09, 2007

Bhopal -- MP government authorities are now confident of disposing of the solid toxic wastes lying on the Union Carbide India Ltd premises. They say non-government organisations are main hurdle than the gas victims in removing the toxic wastes.

The Madhya Pradesh Pollution Control Board and Bhopal Gas Relief and Rehabilitation Department do not see any possible threat to the environment while transporting or disposing of the toxic waste.

“It has been lying there, unattended, in the open, for at least 19 years. How toxicity increases with the passage of time we don’t know,” said Krishna Kant Dubey, a senior official with the Bhopal Gas Relief and Rehabilitation Department.

The MP Pollution Control Board also does not see any potential hazard in handling the solid toxic wastes. “No one is interested in its disposal. If disposal takes place, there will be no issue. We have recommended the (solid waste) disposal to the task force. Now the state government has to execute the task. Half the solid waste will be land-filled and the rest will be incinerated by Bharuch Enviro Infrastructure Ltd (BEIL) in Ankleshwar Gujrat.”

Recently, MK Nagrik Parivahan & Udyog Sahakari Samiti, a company, has responded to a tender floated for the second time by the Bhopal Gas Relief and Rehabilitation Department for removing 46 tonnes of lime sludge. The sludge is to be transported and land-filled in Pithampur (Dhar district) site developed by the Ramky Group.

NGOs have questioned the experience of the bidder. Government authorities say it will not be a simple exercise of transportation.

“Whosever executes the task will have to abide by the norms of the Central Pollution Control Board. The land will be concreted and tagged while the rest of the toxic waste will be reduced to nothing at 1,400 degree temperature,” said SP Gautam, chairman and head of the technical sub-committee that has recommended the terms and condition of the disposal.

The Bhopal Gas Relief and Rehabilitation Department has also questioned the role of the Gujarat Pollution Control board on its refusal to accept the toxic waste. “Why did they (Gujarat Pollution Control Board) accept the Jabalpur High Court’s orders last month? They should have refused before the court,” said Dubey. However, some officials in the state government believe that the Gujarat government wants to avoid the matter since elections are nearing.

Replying to a question that if NGOs want Dow Chem to remove the waste and a claim for environment pollution, Dubey said, “We work on the pollution pace principle. There was no Act on environment till 1989. How can you punish someone in retrospect? Fortunately, the court has discretionary powers in such cases otherwise we would be helpless.”

Both the authorities are confident that the toxic waste removal process will be completed in accordance with the guidelines issued by the Jabalpur High Court, within two months with the NGO’s cooperation.

NEW DELHI - A generation after the world’s worst ever industrial disaster occurred at a U.S. multinational-owned pesticide plant in Bhopal, central India, responsibility continues to be evaded on cleaning up thousands of tonnes of toxic chemicals that have contaminated the soil and water in the vicinity.

The U.S. multinational, Dow Chemical, has now offered to partially bear the cost of cleaning the site of the plant that infamously leaked poisonous cyanide gases into the city in December 1984 causing some 4,000 immediate deaths. In return, Dow wants to be freed of legal liability inherited from Union Carbide Corp., which it bought in 2001.

By natural law Dow takes over all its liabilities as well as assets. But Dow has been lobbying hard, both directly and through the U.S. government, to influence senior officials of the Indian government to obtain a ruling in its favour.

If it succeeds, Dow can walk away from its responsibility of clearing the mess left behind by Carbide, which includes over 9,000 tonnes of poisonous chemicals which have contaminated soil and water and affected over 25,000 people living in the plant’s vicinity. Dow is holding out the lure of large-scale investments in India if it is let off the liability hook.

Dow’s latest offer follows numerous pleadings on its behalf by powerful Indian officials in the Planning Commission, Finance Minister P. Chidambaram and Commerce Minister Kamal Nath, as well as the U.S.-India Business Council composed of top-notch business leaders from both countries.

Apart from the deadly leakage of methyl isocyanate and other toxic gases that, activists believe killed at least 8,000 people in the first week there was enormous chemical damage that affected more than 200,000. This may have caused a further 15,000 deaths and continued disabilities and suffering among the survivors, including grievous damage to their lungs and other organs.

Carbide managed to escape civil liability for the faulty plant design and gross negligence which led to the accident by paying the paltry sum of 470 million US dollars in what was regarded as a collusive and unfair settlement in 1989. But its criminal liability still survives.

However, both Union Carbide and its directors refused to stand trial in a Bhopal criminal court and have proved absconders from the law. Dow has, in fact, been sheltering a fugitive from Indian law and selling Carbide’s products, technologies and services in India.

"Dow’s offer confronts the Indian government with a critical choice," says Satinath Sarangi, of the Bhopal Group for Information and Action, which first discovered and established the toxic contamination of the soil and groundwater in 1990. "Either it collaborates and cuts a deal with a multinational corporation in a mercenary fashion; or it sides with the victims, who have been affected by chemicals leaching from the industrial waste include some that cause birth defects and cancers and damage to the lungs, kidneys and the liver."

The Indian government is sharply divided over the issue. Its Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilisers has held Dow legally liable for cleaning the site of the wastes, and demanded in court that the company deposit Rupees one billion (25 million dollars) as initial payment for the cost of the remediation (decontamination) pending adjudication of the matter.

But the Ministry of Law opposes this and says the determination of liability would depend on the terms of the 2001 merger between Dow and Carbide, whose fine print would have to be studied.

According to the organisations of the Bhopal victims, Carbide made a misrepresentation by claiming that it has no liabilities on account of the gas leak disaster. In fact, Union Carbide, some of its directors, including former chairman Warren Anderson, and its Indian subsidiary, stand charged before an Indian court with causing death by a negligent act.

Dow maintains that being a U.S. company, it is not subject to the jurisdiction of the Indian courts. The courts have not yet made a ruling on Dow's liability, but only asked that a part of the overground wastes, some 386 tonnes secured in a warehouse, be removed to a town in Gujarat to be incinerated.

The Madhya Pradesh High Court is however silent on what should be done with the 8,000 tonnes of chemical waste that lies underground at the plant site and also with the hundreds of tonnes that is strewn all over the compound. Victims’ organisations argue that incineration is an unsafe and improper method of disposing of the waste, and that India does not have the right technology to detoxify it.

As an alternative method, they cite the example of Unilever Corp., which was ordered in 2003 by the Madras High Court to take 230 tonnes of mercury waste it had dumped in Kodaikanal in Tamil Nadu all the way to the U.S. for detoxification.

Two years ago, the victims’ groups, including the Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Stationery Karamchari Sangh, Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Purush Sangarsh Morcha, along with the BGIA, succeeded in getting a contract between Dow Chemical and the public sector Indianoil Corporation annulled. This involved the licensing of a proprietary technology of Union Carbide, which is a 100 percent-owned subsidiary of Dow.

Dow is negotiating the sale of petrochemicals technologies with Reliance Industries Ltd, one of India's largest private sector companies, which belongs to the Mukesh Ambani group.

"Evidently, all manner of entrenched interests are at work to help Dow duck its legal liability and obligation to clean up the site," says Nityanandan Jayaraman, of the International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal. "It’s truly appalling that the Indian government is bowing to their pressure, and that too at a time when large volumes of foreign direct investment, exceeding ten billion dollars this year, are flowing into the country."

Jayaraman added that this showed up the ‘’utter servility on the part of the government towards the U.S. and giant transnational corporations, a phenomenon that has been in evidence ever since 1984. Clearly, high rates of GDP growth and India’s claim to be an emerging economic superpower have not prevented it from acting like a Fourth World country, which puts corporate investment above the life and well-being of its citizens."

If the Indian government succumbs to pressure from Dow, from powerful Indian industrialists like Ratan Tata (who lobbied on the company's behalf), and from some of its own pro-neoliberal ministers, that will only add further insult to the colossal injury the victims have suffered, say activists.

Most of the Bhopal victims received less than 150 dollars for extensive injuries and prolonged suffering. Even families of the dead got as little as 5,000 dollars. A good deal of the compensation was alleged to have been siphoned off by corrupt officials, politicians and middlemen.

Babulal Gaur is referring to surface wastes, and not the thousands of tonnes of underground wastes feeding poison into local aquifers(ed.).

Bhopal, July 27 (UNI) The Madhya Pradesh government has provided Rs 2 crore for removing the chemical waste left out on the premises of the Union Carbide's pesticide plant after the 1984 gas leak disaster, Bhopal Gas Tragedy Relief Minister Babulal Gaur told the Assembly today.

The chemical residue would be removed on the directive of the High Court, he told Dr Sunilam(SP) in a written reply.

A team, headed by Bhopal Medical College professor, was carrying out survey to assess the impact from the chemical waste on the health of residents of the area, he added.

Signs of surprising efficiency within the government of India? Within two weeks of the ICJB releasing the PMO Files, Montek Singh, one of the officials exposed as a conspirator, declares that the Tata plan to bail out Dow has been shelved...

New delhi, PTI, July 12: Industry doyen Ratan Tata has offered to negotiate with Dow Chemicals for a settlement on cleaning Bhopal Gas accident site, but the government cannot accept it, Planning Commission has said.

"Ratan Tata has made a proposal to government that he is willing to lead remediation efforts. But actually it turns out that it's not going to happen because the court has already directed the government to stop the process of remediation, which we are doing," Planning Commission Deputy Chairman told the state-run Lok Sabha television.

Tata, who is the chief of the salt-to-software group is also heading the Investment Commission, which facilitates inflow of FDI into the country.

The Bhopal Gas Tragedy, which occurred due to leakage of toxic gases from the plant of Union Carbide in December 1984 had killed many people and affected thousands.

Although the issue of compensation to victims of disaster has been settled by the Supreme Court, the problems concerning the cleaning up of the site of toxicity remains for which the NGOs had filed a case in the Madhya Pradesh High Court.

Ahluwalia further told the channel that "I think it is absolutely vital that site remediation should take place. So there is no dispute on that."

The controversial move by the Madhya Pradesh government to incinerate some waste from the the Union Carbide factory in Bhopal has met with stiff opposition. Civil society groups have strongly criticised the plan to take the waste to an incinerator in Gujarat.

They say the incinerator at Ankleshwar is badly equipped and the move will merely shift the health hazards and in no way help dispose the toxic chemical waste. Moreover, the move will rid Dow Chemicals—responsible for the waste’s disposal—of the responsibility, say the groups. They moved the High Court of Madhya Pradesh against the plan, but the court declined to interfere into the matter.

7 per cent solution
The move comes under the directives of the high court. The court has ordered the state and the centre to jointly bear the cost of Rs 2 crore for the disposal. Of the 5,000 tonnes waste stored at a warehouse in the factory, 345 metric tonnes will reach Ankleshwar-based Bharuch Environ Infrastructure Limited (biel) in Gujarat for incineration.

Another 40 tonnes will be disposed in a landfill in Pithampur in Indore. These are 6.9 and 0.8 per cent of the total waste.

The Bhopal Gas Tragedy Relief and Rehabilitation Department (bgtrrd) is awaiting clearance of the complete schedule of the disposal procedure from the high court.

“In anticipation, all preparations to transport the toxic chemical waste have been started,” says Ajit Kesri, bgtrd secretary.

The Madhya Pradesh Pollution Control Board (mppcb), part of the task force set up by the high court in 2005 to give technical expertise for the clean-up, has said it will not monitor the disposal.

The Gujarat Pollution Control Board (gpcb) has backed it, maintaining that the site is fully equipped to handle the waste. “Having assessed the facilities of beil, we have approved their plan,” says gpcb’s regional officer at Bharuch. The chairman of mppcb, S P Gautam, agrees: “The incinerator is of international standards and one of the best in the country regardless of what ngos say.” mppcb, according to Gautam, will give its consent for transporting the toxic waste and also monitor the procedure once bgtrrd completes tenders for the transport vehicles.

In Ahmedabad, representatives of beil said the company runs a world-class waste treatment plant, which has adequate facilities for transport, storage and disposal of any kind of hazardous solid waste. Former Narmada development minister Jaynarayan Vyas backs beil, saying the Bhopal toxic waste can safely be managed at Ankleshwar without any harm to the local environment. “What we are bringing is solid waste and not any liquid. The waste has been lying there for over two decades and must have got diluted now. So it can be managed safely at Ankleshwar,” he says.

Question of capacity
Not everybody is buying this claim. Groups representing the survivors of the Bhopal tragedy and activists in Gujarat question the incinerator’s ability to control pollution. They say incineration of the toxic waste will pollute the area the way Union Carbide did, triggering another tragedy. That a national company has undertaken the disposal goes against the ‘polluter pays principle’, they say.

Bhopal Group of Information and Action, an ngo, has filed a petition in the high court seeking a ban on the disposal.

It has also submitted a report comparing the Treatment Storage Disposal Facility (tsdf) in biel and with the one in Biebesheim, Germany. The report was prepared by Eckart Schultes, hazardous waste management expert in Karnataka.

The report says the small facility at Ankleshwar can cause fluctuations in temperature, causing mercury emissions. Emissions of chemical pollutants and acidic gases at the facility are likely to be several times higher than what many internationally available incineration technologies generate; and land filling of dust and ashes from the incinerator without stabilisation can contaminate local environment with toxic heavy metals, salts and inorganic compounds. All these can cause long lasting health and environmental problems to 100,000 people in the area.

The waste, says the report, will be manually emptied and re-packaged in plastic bags. This involves high health and safety risks and the facility is inexperienced to handle this since it has been operational for only two years.

According to the report, the landfill at Pithampur is unsafely located on a hill and rainwater can get into it. It has inadequate monitoring of leachates. According to Satinath Sarangi of Sambhavna Trust, an advocacy group, a small amount of toxic material disposed inefficiently can cause environmental problems at both the sites.

Don’t bring it here
In Gujarat, residents have organised protest rallies under Ankleshwar Bachao Samiti. Zia Pathan, a resident, says: “We have warned the authorities. If the waste is brought here for disposal, we would launch an agitation,” adding, “So far they have not said when they would bring the waste.”

Environmentalist Rohit Prajapati says the Central Pollution Control Board (cpcb) in December 2006 asked gpcb to assess the facilities at the Ankleshwar plant, asking it to conduct an exhaustive study of the region’s capacity for handling pollutants. “The Bharuch region of Gujarat has been under intense pressure due to the high air and water pollution potential on account of the large number of chemical industries…,” cpcb said. However, gpcb secretary Sanjeev Tyagi says it needs time to carry out the directive since it has to arrange for the resources. This flies in the face of the board’s claim that Bharuch can handle the waste.

Safer alternative
ngos say there are alternatives. They have come up with a plan of action to deal with the issue (see box: An alternative plan). Instead of taking toxic waste to Ankleshwar and Pithampur, the government should invest the fund to make provisions for stopping toxic wastes seeping into ground during monsoon, the activists say. They also demand Dow Chemicals take back the waste to the us, like Unilever did—by shipping the toxic waste it made in Kodaikanal. The waste can be safely disposed in the us, which has advanced technology. The company has not yet dealt with the total waste at the factory and no proper assessment of it has been done by any agency, they say. “Government organisations have caused delay and confusion. No attempt has been made to compare studies on other hazardous wastes with the Carbide factory waste,” says Sarangi.

Activist wants decision to dispose off waste at Ankleshwar reversed

Vadodara, June 21: The Madhya Pradesh High Court on Thursday admitted an application that seeks to reverse the decision to dispose off the Bhopal Gas Tragedy waste at Ankleshwar in Bharuch district. The application has been submitted by an Ankleshwar-based activist, Zia Pathan.

The court has set August 8 as the date for the hearing when Pathan could present his case.

The application cites excerpts from the Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB) report of June 2006 that maintains that Ankleshwar is a hotspot in terms of pollution. It also cites media reports about protests against bringing the waste for treatment to Ankleshwar.

"We know the decision would not be reversed immediately, but at least I have been allowed to present my case," said Pathan.

The 300 tonnes of hazardous waste from the Union Carbide (now Dow Chemicals) plant in Bhopal is to be treated at the Ankleshwar waste disposal facility called Bharuch Enviro Infrastructure Ltd (BEIL).

According to Pathan, the GPCB report clearly mentions Ankleshwar as a hotspot owing to the presence of a large number of chemical industries. "Most of the people in Ankleshwar, including the city municipality, are against the decision, as it would only worsen the state of an already polluted town," said Pathan.

He added that awareness among the citizens about the danger was only increasing.

Vadodara-based environmental NGO Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti (PSS) is also working closely with Pathan. PSS frontman Rohit Prajapati said that air samples that he had taken earlier suggested that the presence of carcinogenic chemicals were at levels higher than permissible limits.

"We hope to get a favourable decision from the court. Meanwhile, there might even be more demonstrations in Ankleshwar," he said.

People resist move to dispose of Bhopal gas tragedy's toxic wastes in Gujarat

A drive down National High-way 8 linking Vadodara and Mumbai exposes one to the gravity of pollution in and around Ankleshwar, one of the main chemical industrial estates in Gujarat. More than one lakh people live in Ankleshwar, Panoli and Jhagadia industrial estates, inhaling life-threatening gases.

Ismail Bhaiyat, 73, a resident of neigbouring Sanjali, struggles to breathe and the very mention of pollution makes him hysterical. His wife, too, is ailing and weak and their home is stacked with medical reports.

The Gujarat Ecology Commission, an autonomous body of the Gujarat government, in a report five years ago, dubbed Ankleshwar a "toxic hotspot" as its air pollution "was not monitored regularly". Now the danger level is set to rise, fear environmentalists. The Madhya Pradesh government is taking 346 metric tonnes of toxic waste from the Bhopal gas tragedy-which killed over 3,800 people and affected over half a million on December 3, 1984-to be disposed of at Bharuch Enviro Infrastructure Limited (BEIL) in Ankleshwar.

One Alok Pratap Singh had filed a petition in the Madhya Pradesh High Court in 2004, demanding that the waste be disposed of. The High Court had set up a task force and recommended that the wastes be taken to BEIL. The wastes contain traces of semi-processed pesticides, naphthol, excavated wastes and reactor residues. The decision has sparked off environmental and health concerns.

Dr Ranjan Pasricha, a neuro-physician in Ankleshwar, said: "I have been seeing several cases of cerebral tuberculosis and these can be directly and indirectly linked to pollution. Pollution weakens lungs and other body parts." He is currently treating a 12-year-old girl.

Pollution has already killed natural water resources, leaving the farmers in trouble. "In the past, a monitoring committee of the Supreme Court had taken note of the pollution and said that the ineffective practices of entrepreneurs and laxity of authorities in implementing environmental regulations had exhausted the groundwater supplies," says Rohit Prajapati of Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti, a Vadodara-based group of environmentalists.

The Samiti has raised doubts about the incinerating capacity of BEIL, quoting a German technical cooperation study that highlighted several shortcomings in the BEIL incinerator. However, the director of BEIL, Ashok Panjwani, rubbished all allegations and claimed that the plant had state-of-the-art technology created as per the guidelines of the Central Pollution Control Board. "Ours is the best place in the country to incinerate the waste," claimed Rajjubhai Patel, chairman of United Phosphorus Limited, a major equity stakeholder in BEIL.

Dr P.N. Parmeshwaran Moothathu, senior general manager (environment) of UPL, said there would not be any air pollution. Sanjiv Tyagi, member (secretary) of Gujarat Pollution Control Board-which has given a no objection certificate for one-time disposal of the toxic waste-did not rule out air pollution, but said it was within "permissible standards".

The Madhya Pradesh government will pay Rs 90 lakh to BEIL for the job. The company said the process would take only a few days and that the waste would be brought in a covered vehicle.

Environmentalists are not ready to buy these arguments. They are against the very move to dispose of the waste in India. Said Madhumita Dutta of International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal: "Survivors of the Bhopal tragedy want the waste to be sent to the US, and Dow Chemicals, which took over the Union Carbide Company, to pay for it." They have, in fact, sought an intervention in the ongoing case.

"Why should the people of Ankleshwar or any part of India suffer?" asked Ziya Pathan, a lawyer in Ankleshwar. The increasing pollution has already made youngsters and children prone to diseases like bronchitis. (None of the doctors say it on record.) Prajapati pointed out that the government had not carried out a comprehensive health check-up of residents. Gujarat Health Minister Ashok Bhatt disagreed, and claimed that the workers were covered under Employees' State Insurance Scheme and health camps were conducted.

Hard to believe, considering the plight of the residents of the region. Mohammad Phaiyad, sarpanch of Kharod village near Ankleshwar, said, "People suffer from skin diseases and breathing problems. The eyes burn. The troubles increased in the last decade. How can we permit more wastes to be brought in?" People also suffer from scabies, a skin disease, said Dr Anwar Kanuga. "This is because of water pollution caused by the industrial wastes dumped into wells," he says.

Sixty-year-old Balu Sita Vasava's family of seven was orphaned when he succumbed to tuberculosis a fortnight ago. "He was a healthy man. But in the last six years, he had developed breathing problems," said Balu's widow, Chanchalben. One of his daughters is suffering from tuberculosis.

Tuberculosis, though, is not a direct consequence of pollution. It is common knowledge that any type of pollution affects the lungs and weakens the immune system, leaving the person susceptible to various diseases. Dr A.K. Patel, a surgeon in Ankleshwar, said smoking is another factor, but admitted that pollution had to be controlled to improve health and environmental conditions.

Although the 200-plus industries in the region are supposed to release their treated effluents into a 44-km pipeline project of Bharuch Eco-Aqua Infrastructure Limited, a sister concern of BEIL, for pumping them 9.4km into the sea, this does not happen.

With the hearing still on, it is uncertain when the Bhopal wastes would reach Ankleshwar. Said Panjwani, "It may take a week, or maybe even six months. The decision itself took 23 years."

The local people are hoping the day never comes at all.

Vadodara, May 2: It is not just the experts who contended that the Bhopal Gas Tragedy waste cannot be disposed off at the Ankleshwar incinerator. An independent study conducted barely two months ago by German company GTZ based in Frankfurt, raised doubts about the capacity of the Ankleshwar incinerators to handle the disposal of toxic waste. The study, carried out in conjunction with the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board, throws up some startling facts about the Ankleshwar incinerator like its small size, high emission of dust and gases and untreated ash disposal.

Speaking to The Indian Express, Ashok Panjwani, Director of Bharuch Enviro Infrastructure Limited (BEIL) that runs the incinerator said he had no misgivings. "Technically, there is no problem, we have been handling chemical waste for about one and a half years. The protests are more emotional than technical," Panjwani said.

The major difference that GTZ found between the two incinerators was in size and capacity. The report states that while the Biebesheim incinerator could handle drums with a capacity of 200 litres, the Ankleshwar one could handle only those drums that were lesser than 60 litres. According to the report, this aspect might disturb the thermal destruction. The report found no fire detectors in storage areas and no on-site fire brigade. Also, drums larger than 60 litres must be manually emptied and repacked in plastic bags, which could harm the employees in Ankleshwar, stated the report.

Commenting about the emissions after incineration, the report stated that after incineration, the emissions of total organic carbon and nitrogen oxide (mono, di and so on) at Ankleshwar might exceed the German permit limit value by a factor of 2 and emissions of dust and acidic gases by factors of 4 and 5. The GTZ researchers also found that the residual ash from incineration was disposed without further treatment in the Ankleshwar landfill. This residual waste might contain heavy metals that were volatilised during combustion, which poses a serious health hazard. Also, this residual ash was found not suitable for landfill disposal according to German standards.

The study report, which The Indian Express possesses, was aimed at comparing incinerators, facilities and procedures for hazardous and toxic wastes in India and Germany from the technical and ecological point of view. It also assessed the differences in equipment and environmental management of incinerators.

When asked, Panjwani agreed that though many such studies have been carried out, the BEIL incinerator had already handled waste more toxic than that of the Union Carbide's. "This incinerator was built according to our requirement, I do not know what the German incinerator was required for. But I am sure we can handle this," he said.