Gujarat environmentalists seek chemical emergency in Vadodara industry cluster, cite high level of water pollution

Counterview Desk
Two top environmentalists from Gujarat have revealed that a recent joint visit of Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB) and Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) officials in Vadodara’s industrial region has found the chemical oxygen demand (COD) of 890 to 1,022 mg per litre of water in channels which are supposed to carry treated, against the maximum norm of 250 mg per litre.
Pointing out that the latest tests wree carried out between November 21 and 23, 2016 at a village Vedach situated in Bharuch district after the channel passes through 24 villages in Vadodara district, senior environmentalists Rohit Prajapati and Krishnakant have alleged that the high level of pollution in water in the 55.6 km long effluent channel of the Effluent Channel Project (ECP) in Vadodara suggests that ECP is “not able to meet the norms since many years.”
Chemical oxygen demand (COD) test is used as a useful measure the amount of organic pollutants in surface water, including wastewater to ascertain of the water quality. It is expressed in milligrams per liter (mg per litre), which indicates the mass of oxygen consumed per liter of solution.
Asking Government of India to declare chemical emergency for ECP industrial cluster of Vadodara district, even as cancelling consolidated consent and authorization of the Vadodara Envior Channel Limited, responsible for ECP, the environmentalists have also sought cancellation of environment clearance of all the defaulting polluting industries of the ECP industrial cluster of Vadodara District.
In a letter to the secretary, Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change, Government of India, the environmentalists have said, the ECP channel passes through 24 villages and prime agricultural land, which is known as the vegetable basket of Gujarat.
Commissioned in 1983 to carry treated industrial effluent from industries near Vadodara to estuary of River Mahi, Gulf of Khambhat, the environmentalists say, the channel carries the effluent of Nandesari Industrial Estate and Vadodara Industrial Complex, apart from a number of polluting industries started coming up on along both side of ECP.
“Since 2004 the villages around the ECP channel have experienced ground water contamination at alarming rates”, they say, adding, “The pollution began because of the seepage, leaching, leaking and overflowing of effluent from the channel and later from illegal untreated effluent discharged by number of polluting industries.”
Pointing out that there have been several investigations conducted by CPCB and GPCB, and other agencies appointed by the concerned authorities, they say, the latest in the series of indictments is “Ground Water Pollution In Luna, Dudhawada, Piludara Area Near Vadodara, Gujarat”, released in July 2016, which followed “Report On Effluent Conveyance System for Nandesari Industrial Area And Industries Located Near Vadodara, Gujarat” of February 2010.
“Nobody, neither even GPCB nor industrialists, have denied that the groundwater is severely contaminated and contamination is spreading in different areas and has reached irreversible level because of industrial activities”, environmentalists contend adding, investigations reveal that “almost all wells and bore wells were contaminated.”

Citing a study in Luna Village conducted in May 2015, they say, it “prima facie proved that its ground water is severely contaminated and contamination is spreading”, adding, “In April 2015 another investigation was conducted by GPCB in Dudhwala village of Vadodara district and in villages Piludara and Vedach of Bharuch district, which illustrated the fact that the bore wells of even these villages too are severely contaminated.”

Comments

Urgent need to study cause of large number of natural deaths in Gulf countries

By Venkatesh Nayak* According to data tabled in Parliament in April 2018, there are 87.76 lakh (8.77 million) Indians in six Gulf countries, namely Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). While replying to an Unstarred Question (#6091) raised in the Lok Sabha, the Union Minister of State for External Affairs said, during the first half of this financial year alone (between April-September 2018), blue-collared Indian workers in these countries had remitted USD 33.47 Billion back home. Not much is known about the human cost of such earnings which swell up the country’s forex reserves quietly. My recent RTI intervention and research of proceedings in Parliament has revealed that between 2012 and mid-2018 more than 24,570 Indian Workers died in these Gulf countries. This works out to an average of more than 10 deaths per day. For every US$ 1 Billion they remitted to India during the same period there were at least 117 deaths of Indian Workers in Gulf ...

A comrade in culture and controversy: Yao Wenyuan’s revolutionary legacy

By Harsh Thakor* This year marks two important anniversaries in Chinese revolutionary history—the 20th death anniversary of Yao Wenyuan, and the 50th anniversary of his seminal essay "On the Social Basis of the Lin Biao Anti-Party Clique". These milestones invite reflection on the man whose pen ignited the first sparks of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution and whose sharp ideological interventions left an indelible imprint on the political and cultural landscape of socialist China.

India's health workers have no legal right for their protection, regrets NGO network

Counterview Desk In a letter to Union labour and employment minister Santosh Gangwar, the civil rights group Occupational and Environmental Health Network of India (OEHNI), writing against the backdrop of strike by Bhabha hospital heath care workers, has insisted that they should be given “clear legal right for their protection”.

Uttarakhand tunnel disaster: 'Question mark' on rescue plan, appraisal, construction

By Bhim Singh Rawat* As many as 40 workers were trapped inside Barkot-Silkyara tunnel in Uttarkashi after a portion of the 4.5 km long, supposedly completed portion of the tunnel, collapsed early morning on Sunday, Nov 12, 2023. The incident has once again raised several questions over negligence in planning, appraisal and construction, absence of emergency rescue plan, violations of labour laws and environmental norms resulting in this avoidable accident.

History, culture and literature of Fatehpur, UP, from where Maulana Hasrat Mohani hailed

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat* Maulana Hasrat Mohani was a member of the Constituent Assembly and an extremely important leader of our freedom movement. Born in Unnao district of Uttar Pradesh, Hasrat Mohani's relationship with nearby district of Fatehpur is interesting and not explored much by biographers and historians. Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri has written a book on Maulana Hasrat Mohani and Fatehpur. The book is in Urdu. He has just come out with another important book, 'Hindi kee Pratham Rachna: Chandayan' authored by Mulla Daud Dalmai.' During my recent visit to Fatehpur town, I had an opportunity to meet Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri and recorded a conversation with him on issues of history, culture and literature of Fatehpur. Sharing this conversation here with you. Kindly click this link. --- *Human rights defender. Facebook https://www.facebook.com/vbrawat , X @freetohumanity, Skype @vbrawat

Job opportunities decreasing, wages remain low: Delhi construction workers' plight

By Bharat Dogra* It was about 32 years back that a hut colony in posh Prashant Vihar area of Delhi was demolished. It was after a great struggle that the people evicted from here could get alternative plots that were not too far away from their earlier colony. Nirmana, an organization of construction workers, played an important role in helping the evicted people to get this alternative land. At that time it was a big relief to get this alternative land, even though the plots given to them were very small ones of 10X8 feet size. The people worked hard to construct new houses, often constructing two floors so that the family could be accommodated in the small plots. However a recent visit revealed that people are rather disheartened now by a number of adverse factors. They have not been given the proper allotment papers yet. There is still no sewer system here. They have to use public toilets constructed some distance away which can sometimes be quite messy. There is still no...

Women's rights leaders told to negotiate with Muslimness, as India's donor agencies shun the word Muslim

By A Representative Former vice-president Hamid Ansari has sharply criticized donor agencies engaged in nongovernmental development work, saying that they seek to "help out" marginalizes communities with their funds, but shy away from naming Muslims as the target group, something, he insisted, needs to change. Speaking at a book release function in Delhi, he said, since large sections of Muslims are poor, they need political as also social outreach.

Warning bells for India: Tribal exploitation by powerful corporate interests may turn into international issue

By Ashok Shrimali* Warning bells are ringing for India. Even as news drops in from Odisha that Adivasi villages, one after another, are rejecting the top UK-based MNC Vedanta's plea for mining, a recent move by two senior scholars Felix Padel and Samarendra Das suggests the way tribals are being exploited in India by powerful international and national business interests may become an international issue. In fact, one has only to count days when things may be taken up at the United Nations level, with India being pushed to the corner. Padel, it may be recalled, is a major British authority on indigenous peoples across the world, with several scholarly books to his credit.

Gujarat Bitcoin scam worth Rs 5,000 crore "linked" with BJP leaders: Need for Supreme Court monitored probe

By Shaktisinh Gohil* BJP hit a jackpot in the form of demonetisation, which it used as an alibi to convert black money into white in Gujarat. Even as party scrambles for answers of how the Ahmedabad District Cooperative Bank (ADCB), whose director is BJP president Amit Shah, received old currency worth Rs 745.58 crore in just five days, and how Rs 3118.51 crore was deposited in 11 district cooperative banks linked with Gujarat BJP leaders, a new mega Bitcoin scam, worth more than Rs 5,000 crore has been unraveled.

Counterview

Search This Blog