When will India be able to control pollution ?

When will India be able to control pollution ?

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Anil Agarwal

Many journalists have been asking the question: What will India's environment look like in the 21st century? Since India is already one of the most polluted countries in the world, an important question is: Will India ever be able to control pollution and, if so, when?

Most of the Indian rivers, especially the smaller ones, are today toxic drains: Sabarmati, Bhadar, Yamuna, Damodar, Chaliyar, Betwa, Noyyal, Bhawani, to name just a few. Groundwater, a major source of drinking water, is also becoming polluted and most of it is drunk without any treatment. But lets talk in some detail about air pollution.

Air pollution in Indian cities is also growing by leaps and bounds. The Central Pollution Control Board (cpcb) has just released the air quality data for 1997 for 70 cities and what does it show? That Shillong is the only town in India where the air quality in terms of suspended particulates -- the most threatening air pollutant in Indian cities was clean round the year and there was no single day either when the air became even moderately polluted.

In all the other 69 cities, the air quality was moderately, highly or critically polluted terms used and defined by the cpcb -- round the year. In some, the air was moderately poor round the year but reached high or critical levels of pollution during certain days in the year. In 33 cities, that is, in about half of all the cities monitored, the air was critically polluted round the year and they had days when the air quality was nothing short of disastrous (see table: Air Quality in Indian cities in 1997). Another 40 per cent of the cities had high or moderate levels of pollution round the year but had certain days when the pollution reached critical levels.

It is often said that Delhi is one of the most polluted cities in the world. And by implication, people tend to believe that it is the most polluted city in India. But this is not true. While it is indeed one of the most polluted cities in the world the World Health Organisation monitors the air quality in about 20 cities of the world and Delhi indeed figures high on that list Delhi is not one of the most polluted cities in India, according to the data collected by the Central Pollution Control Board. In 1997, the annual average concentration of total suspended particulate matter in Delhi was 339.3 microgrammes per cubic metre (g/cum) in other words, Delhi's air was critically polluted round the year. But Surat, Patna, Jharia, Faridabad, Kanpur, Agra and Ankleshwar had still higher levels of particulate pollution than Delhi round the year ranging from 384 g/cum to 412 g/cum.

We find the same situation when we compare pollution on the worst day of the year. In Delhi, the peak pollution reached 1,055 g/cum in 1997. In other words, on that particular day, Delhi's pollution was nothing short of disastrous. But Kochi reached an astonishing 2,506 g/cum on the most polluted day, Lucknow 2,339 g/cum, Kanpur 1,385 g/cum, Chandigarh 1,254 g/cum, Alwar 1,237 g/cum, Patna 1,229, Agra 1,222 g/cum and Ankleshwar 1,198 g/cum. Udaipur and Mumbai were close behind Delhi with peak concentrations of 1,025 g/cum and 1,019 g/cum, respectively.

In short, the picture of air pollution is nothing short of horrendous. Moreover, this pollution is widespread and growing. And this is the picture when the quality of pollution monitoring is extremely poor.

Firstly, there are cities like Varanasi and Srinagar whose air quality is not even monitored. Not only is pollution in Srinagar high, there are reports that is getting high even in Agartala, to name just a few such towns.

Secondly, even in cities where air quality is monitored, the number of monitoring stations is very small. Delhi today has only about ten pollution monitoring stations whereas it should have some 60-100 stations. The average of a such a large number of stations could be much higher than what is given today.

Thirdly, a large number of critical pollutants are not even being monitored. What pollution control boards monitor in the name of suspended particulates is Total Suspended Particulate Matter which hardly any industrialised country in the world monitors today. This is because particles which are bigger than 10 microns that is, one-millionth of a metre -- in diameter do not penetrate the respiratory system much. Over a decade ago most industrialised countries had switched to measuring only pm10 that is, particles of or less than 10 microns. There is only one station in India in Delhi where pm10 monitoring began in 1998. India is way behind and will be so even in the future. Now most advanced countries are moving to measuring pm2.5 because particles of this size are far worse than pm10. Because of the preponderance of 2-stroke scooters on India's roads, another major pollutant in India's urban air is benzene a potent cancer-causing agent like particles. This too is not monitored in India.

The limited monitoring that has been done in Delhi shows extraordinary results. pm10 levels in Delhi reached an astonishing 820 g/cum--eight times above the specified standard and possibly way beyond anything recorded in any other city in the world. pm10 levels were far worse than the levels of Total Suspended Particulate Matter in Delhi when the two were compared with their specific standards. The few studies done on benzene levels in Delhi show that this cancer-causing pollutant reaches even more disastrous levels well over a thousand times the standard.

And what is incredible is that neither the Central government nor any of the state governments have as of yet cared to formulate a plan to control this pollution and bring it to acceptable levels. If anything is happening piecemeal or whatever it is because of the Supreme Court or the High Courts.

So what are we to do with this pollution?

Power plants, industries and vehicles are the biggest sources of pollution. The rate with which vehicular pollution is growing is absolutely astonishing. The Centre for Science and Environment has found that between 1975 and 1995 a period during which the country's economy (gross domestic product or gdp) grew by about 2.5 times the vehicular pollution load grew by eight times. And since India is just in the nascent stages of industrialisation, power generation, motorisation and urbanisation, we can be certain that pollution will grow by leaps and bounds unless major efforts are made to control it. That is, unless we very carefully take an environment-friendly path for industrialisation, power generation, motorisation and urbanisation.

The question, therefore, is: Will we? It is always hard to predict the future but if we look at past trends the simple answer is: Not for a very long time. Let us see what history teaches us. Pollution grew very rapidly in the Western countries soon after the economic boom that followed the Second World War a period during which the West created enormous economic wealth. By the late 1950s, the air and water was extremely polluted. The Thames and the Rhine had become sewers. Japan was suffering from an unknown but horrifying neurological disorder called the Minamata Disease. It was impossible to breathe in Tokyo, London or Los Angeles. This led to a powerful environmental movement in the 1960s and which gained force during the 1970s.

With environment also becoming an electoral issue, governments began to respond. During the 1970s and 1980s, Western governments did two things. Firstly, they enacted strong laws and enforced them with great discipline and, thus, secondly ensured a substantial amount of industrial investment in pollution control. As a result of all these efforts, by the mid-1980s the Thames was once again beginning to breathe and so were the waters of the Stockholm archipelago. And urban air was also reasonably clean. It thus took nearly 20 years or one generation from the mid-1960s to the mid-1980s to bring about the change. And the battle is still far from won. Western industries still produce enormous toxic wastes, carbon dioxide emitted by their power plants, industries and vehicles is threatening to destabilise the world's climate.

In India, we are at the same situation that the West was in the 1960s. The question is: Will we be able to replicate what the West did in one generation? Will India's rivers and cities begin to breathe by the 2020s? The answer is: Very Unlikely. For three key reasons which markedly differentiate us from the West.

lOne, pollution control has yet to become an electoral issue in India. India's politicians have just not shown any serious interest in controlling pollution. They have no courage to take on the big polluters the corporate sector, which too has shown a singular lack of interest in controlling pollution. The government's own companies and power stations are heavy polluters. And politicians do not want to take on the small polluters either the small-scale units or the small taxidrivers/three-wheeler drivers because they constitute important vote banks. Therefore, India's electoral democracy is proving to be very weak to confront the scourge of pollution. As a result, India's pollution control laws are not even worth the piece of paper on which they have been promulgated. And it is unlikely that this situation will change in the near future.

lTwo, pollution control requires enormous discipline and effective regulation. Given the state of political and bureaucratic corruption, again it is extremely unlikely that pollution control laws will be enforced with any level of effectiveness.

lThree, pollution control will require heavy investment and given the fact that India's per capita income even today is far less than what the Western countries had achieved in the 1950s, it is hard to see this investment being made. Unless, of course, the government carefully searches for cost-effective measures. Takes the usually cheaper precautionary measures than the extremely expensive curative measures. And insists that the companies big or small have to meet certain minimum standards or face severe penalties. But neither do our politicians nor do our bureaucrats have any idea of how to do this. The pollution control bureaucracy is today one of the most pathetically incompetent bureaucracies in the country -- and nor does the government want to do anything the polluter-politician-bureaucrat nexus being extremely strong.

What then does this mean? It simply means that India will not be able to clean pollution in one generation. If it takes at least 2 generations, we will begin to see leaner air only by the 2040s. In other words, the current urban generation is going to leave behind a totally unlivable habitat for at least two of its generations. The future is, therefore, nothing less than scary.

One may ask how can generations pass by without any effective action being taken. That this can happen in the future is clearly shown by the past. It was in 1981 that the Air Pollution Control Act was legislated. Nearly 20 years, that is, one generation has already gone by without the Central or any of the state governments having even developed an effective action plan which clearly aims to bring down pollution to levels that will give us clean air. Both the Central and state governments have only promoted cosmetic exercises like checking the tailpipes of private motor cars or scooters a technique that only puts the blame on the victim. Even Andhra Pradesh's chief minister Chandrababu Naidu had his picture proudly taken while checking the exhaust pipe of a car.

What does this pollution mean in terms of economic growth? Will India's economy be affected by this pollution? The unfortunate answer is: No.

Politicians and industrialists do not have to learn any real lesson. Things can go on as usual without any of these groups suffering. As classical economic texts point out, pollution will even help the economy to grow. Bottling water industry will grow by leaps and bounds. So will hospitals and medicine producers and vendors. Yes, certain costs will definitely go up. Drinking water costs, for example. The rich are already paying for bottled drinking water as much as they pay for milk. But, to meet the needs of the poor, the government will have to invest heavily to treat the polluted waters to turn them into drinking water quality and if, however, the government fails to do so because of lack of money or political will, as it is already doing so then it is the poor who will have to pay the biggest price--the price being their very lives.

Air pollution will be the biggest leveller because it will affect both the rich and the poor. But the rich will be able to afford the cost of dealing with chronic asthma and cancer whereas the poor will not be able to do so. In other words, India's wealth will be built on the backs of its poor, its elderly, its children and those genetically susceptible. Not on the back of the economy but on the back of public health.

What does this mean in terms of numbers? How many will die? Today, about a million die each year because of water pollution and this is still largely because of the traditional form of pollution which results from human filth. The new water pollution will add to this all kind of horrendous diseases like cancers and neurological disorders. It is estimated that at least one lakh die each year from urban air pollution. Thus, at the least one million or more will continue to die from pollution each year in India. This figure will rise to probably 2-3 million a year with growing pollution. But tens of millions will suffer from high rates of illness and a very poor quality of life.

If we were to take one generation to control pollution, we would have killed off at least 20-30 million people, mostly poor people. And if we were to take two generations, the numbers could rise to 40-60 million people.

The problem is that these numbers are so small that for India's politicians and industrialists they mean absolutely nothing. What do 50 million deaths or murders mean in a country which is already 1,000 million and likely to grow to 1,500 million soon? Economic growth will come at a high price only for those who suffer from the pollution. Probably 50 million poor people have already been killed off in the last 50 years of Independence because of the inaction on the part of our political system to deal with India's poverty. Independence has definitely come to us at a high cost but it has made no material difference to the politicians of the country.

Surely all this is deeply immoral. But who is going to protest against this immorality?

That is where, in fact, the answer lies. If anything is going to change, it will not come from the electoral part of India's democracy. It will come from those elements of Indian democracy which give its people certain rights the Right to Free Speech, the Right to form Associations, and the Right to Protest, especially the Right to go to Court. In other words, exactly as in the West, it is India's civil society which will have to literally browbeat the country's elected representatives into action. In fact, the fight against pollution will only succeed only if it becomes a people's movement an urban people's movement which can count on an active group against pollution in every town and city of India working together as one force.

But this will not be an easy task. People will be given all kinds of confusing information. By the government most of all and by the industry as well. Critical information will be held back by government officials and scientists. There will be few scientists ready to speak out. Despite the high levels of particulates in India's urban air, the Centre for Science and Environment has not been able to find one single scientist in the country who has studied the health effects of this pollutant. In such a situation, every attempt will be made to divert attention to inconsequential issues. And, to boot, fighting pollution is an intensely scientific task. Unless the civil society itself acquires scientific expertise or finds willing scientists to work with it, and then finds willing judges to tame the politicians and the bureaucrats, getting the balance between environment and development will prove to be an elusive task.

I am convinced that it is not going to be an India that anyone of us dreamed of. Poor. Polluted. And politically sick. Welcome to the 21st century! n

This article appeared in The Hindu on January 23, 2000

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Industry at any cost

Gujarat has more than 90,000 industrial units, according to the state government. About 8,000 of these units are polluting, also says the state government. Major polluting industries are located in the Vadodara Petrochemical Complex, Nandesari, Ankleshwar, Vapi, Vatva and Hazira near Surat. The Gujarat Industrial Development Corporation (gidc) was managing 270 industrial estates as on March 1996, and its activity plan for the year 1998-99 included sanctioning of eight new ones. "About 70 per cent of the investment in Gujarat since the 1970s has been in the chemicals sector," says R C Trivedi, former chairperson of the Gujarat Pollution Control Board (gpcb).

He says that in the 1970s, the state government was encouraging small-scale units in the chemicals sector through financial incentives. "These industrial units came up in huge numbers. But the government gave a very low priority to the environment. This is why environmental problems cropped up in Gujarat," says Trivedi.

Nowhere more so than in the nearly 400-km stretch between Vapi in southern Gujarat and Vatva in northern Gujarat, called the golden corridor, an industrialist's dream come true. This stretch has become a hot bed of pollution. "In the golden corridor, we have created a number of potential disasters similar to the Bhopal gas tragedy. The time-bomb is ticking very fast," says Achyutbhai Yagnik, secretary of Setu, an Ahmedabad-based ngo. Another example of an environmental nightmare is Alang, the largest shipbreaking yard of the world, situated 50 km from Bhavnagar. The 11-km coastline of the yard has been severely polluted due to scrapping of hazardous ships (see 'Bare Facts'; Down To Earth, Vol 6, No 20; March 15, 1998).
Government response, or the lack of it
"We are suffering because of the lack of proper planning in the past. But it is now a futile exercise to blame anyone for that. The situation is in front of everybody. We have to come out of it," says Suresh Mehta, industry minister of Gujarat. Optimistic words. But what is the state government doing to deal with the growing pollution problems? Well, it is trying its best to set up more industries.

The state government has planned the 'Infrastructure Vision 2010', which hardly lays any focus on environment. In a meeting organised by gec in Ahmedabad on October 29, 1999, K V Bhanujan, principal secretary of finance to the state government, had observed: "The 'Vision 2010' is a focused and comprehensive document on infrastructure. But environmental concerns in general or anticipated as a consequence of the implementations of the vision have not been even touched upon anywhere."

Blackened rivers
Gujarat's rivers are bearing the brunt of industrial pollution, as are the people living on the banks of these rivers. All the major rivers and streams of Gujarat are in a bad state due to effluent discharged by industry, be it the Kolak, the Mahi, the Daman Ganga or the Amlakhadi (see p35: Fighting against pollution). One can see red water flowing in the Sabarmati, released by the common effluent treatment plant (cetp) in Vatva. Several times, drug factories in Vapi dump spoilt batches in the open. These contain chemicals that are highly toxic.

Take the case of the farmers from 11 villages between Lali and Navagam, who irrigate their fields with untreated effluents released into the Khari river. Nearly 100 tubewells and borewells have been contaminated. "When factories were prevented from dumping effluents in the Mini river, they resorted to reverse boring, pumping untreated effluents straight into underground aquifers," says Sahabsinh Darbar, 73, a farmer from Sherkhi village in Vadodara district. "We do not require any study to confirm that channels and rivers in Gujarat are polluted. You can see that from the colour of the water," says Mayur Pandya, a noted lawyer who chaired a committee set up to investigate pollution of Khari river near Ahmedabad by the Gujarat High Court in 1995. So, what have the people done to prevent their land and rivers from being defiled?

The rise and fall of a people's campaign
On June 19, 1987, two people who had climbed down to do repair work in a well in Lali village died. The villagers knew the cause of death. Effluents carried by the neighbouring Khari river, better described as an effluent channel, had leached into the groundwater. The reaction had produced poisonous gases, which lead to asphyxiation. The river has been carrying industrial wastes for the past 20 years, says Pravinbhai Jashbhai Patel, a farmer from Navagram village.

A public outcry followed. "But as usual, the government chose to remain silent," says Patel. Finally, on February 16, 1995, the 11 villages filed a public interest petition in the Gujarat High Court. The bench comprising chief justice B N Kirpal and justice H L Gokhale set up the Pandya Committee to look into the matter. The committee reported that water samples taken from the Khari river, where it flows through Lali, had pH levels as low as 2, showing that the water was highly acidic. The biological oxygen demand was about 14 times the permissible limit and the chemical oxygen demand was much more than 16 times the limit, says Jashbhai Patel.

On the basis of the report, on August 5, 1995, the court ordered that 756 industrial units, which were regarded as highly polluting, pay up 1 per cent of their gross turnover of the year 1993-94 or 1995-96, whichever was higher. The court ruled: "The amount be utilised for the works of socio-economic uplift in the villages and on educational, medical and veterinary facilities and the betterment of the agriculture and livestock in the said villages." "But even today, farmers use waters from the polluted Khari river when water is released from the upstream Kadana dam," says Girish Patel, a lawyer based in Ahmedabad. As for compensation, sources point out that while some industrial units have paid up, others are still in the process of doing so. Several units have started production again. The situation has not changed at all. Untreated effluents still flow in the river.

Water in the 100-odd wells near Khari is still a distinct red. Kanubhai Patel, a farmer, says the paddy yield has gone down by half. The villagers find a difference in milk quality, too, which they attribute to cattle grazing in contaminated areas. In August 1999, Down To Earth got a sample of groundwater from Lali village analysed at the Facility for Ecological and Analytical Testing (feat) of the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. It had a mercury concentration that was 211 times the permissible limit (see 'What goes down must come up'; Down To Earth, August 31, 1999). Mercury is an extremely toxic heavy metal and is known to cause damage to kidneys and the central nervous system.

Failure of the courts
The most damaging aspect of Gujarat's struggle against industrial pollution has been the failure of the courts to deliver. There was a phase in 1995 when the Gujarat High Court was cracking down on polluters, giving an impetus to the environmental movement in the state. Hundreds of cases were filed in the court. This continued for two to three years. As long Justice B N Kirpal was the chief justice of the high court, he took stern action against polluters.

After this period, the court got bogged down in dealing with applications to reopen industrial units after a closure order given by justice Kirpal. But the implementing and regulatory agencies remained lackadaisical. Soon, people handling these cases lost interest as the exercise could not yield the desired results. "In Gujarat, industry controls politicians, rather than the other way round. The situation does not look like it will improve," says Mayur Pandya. "If we try to find out how many industrialists have been put behind bars under the Water Act or the Air Act, we will hardly find any. So they are not scared at all," adds Girish Patel.

"The courts usually go by the the findings of gpcb. This is not acceptable at all. The court should stop relying on gpcb information if it wants better results," says Anand Mazgaonkar of pss. He says gpcb annual reports look like primary school books: "These are not the kind of reports needed in a state where so many industries produce extremely toxic chemicals."

Waste: solid and hazardous
Factories have been dumping thousands of tonnes of hazardous wastes in the open. Not only has this polluted the groundwater but it has also damaged fertile lands. Take the case of Bajwa, a village in Vadodara district where industrial waste has been accumulating for the past 30 years and there is barely any agricultural land to be proud of in terms of productivity (see 'Toxic trail'; Down To Earth, Vol 7, No 7; August 31, 1998). Now, industries are constructing landfill sites. But even in the construction and planning of these, environmental health has not been kept in mind. One example is gidc's Nandesari Industrial Estate north of Vadodara. Plans of a site to dump toxic wastes are severely flawed and there are fears of a major ecological disaster (see 'Hell-hole'; Down To Earth, Vol 7, No 14; December 15, 1998).

From Vapi to Mehsana, several units dealing with pharmaceuticals, dyes and dye intermediaries are constructing landfills sites to dump their hazardous wastes. However, Mazgaonkar cites a 1977 study conducted for the us Environmental Protection Agency, conducted on 50 landfills, showed that 86 per cent had contaminated underground water supplies beyond the boundaries of the landfill.

Environment impact assessments by the National Productivity Council, Gandhinagar, in 1997-98 and 1997-98 showed high levels of lead contamination in the groundwater of Nandesari. Samples taken nearby the gidc dump contained 38.25 milligramme per litre (mg/l) of lead, whereas the permissible limit is a mere 0.05 mg/l for drinking water. The groundwater has been severely contaminated to a depth of about 60 metres, the study says.

"Disposal of untreated mercury-contaminated effluent from caustic manufacturers has contaminated large tracks of land in Nandesari in Gujarat," says a draft Sectoral Environment Report submitted in 1997 by the Union ministry of environment and forests to the World Bank.

Systems that do not work
"The entire machinery to control pollution in the state has failed," says Girish Patel. "The view of the ruling party is that environmental problems are just a problem of the elite. They do not accept that the poor people are the most severely affected because it is they who live in a polluted environment and drink contaminated water," he adds.

"GPCB is the one of the worst pollution control boards in India. It has mainly political appointees or bureaucrats at senior positions, who lack knowledge of environmental issues," rues Trivedi (see box: Polluting on legal grounds). "It is an irony that only the first two chairpersons of gpcb had any background in the field of the environment. I was the second chairperson during 1980-82. After me, either bureaucrats or the political appointees have been appointed. A former chairperson of gpcb was allegedly forced to leave because he did not work as the politicians wanted him to," says Trivedi.

"There is no pressure from the implementing agencies over industrialists. They do not have an initiative to meet the environmental norms," he adds. This has certainly helped big industries find ways to flout environmental norms (see box: Bypass for filth). Today, industrialists first invest money in a project and then plead in the court that they cannot stop the work on environmental grounds as they have already made the investment. "In most of the cases, the court relaxes some of the norms. As a result, what happens is that the pollution remains, but the conditions disappear," comments Patel.

A fatigued civil society
"The NGOs that are working in this field do not have the support to do anything concrete. So, by and large, there is no strong voice against pollution problems in Gujarat today," says Girish Patel. D S Ker, president of Gramya Vikas Trust, an ngo based in Dwarka, says: "ngos here have not been able to mobilise grassroots-level support. The voice of ngos in the state mainly comes from the middle class. But these people have not been able to carry together the grassroots level people."

Although people of Gujarat are gradually realising that pollution is becoming a serious problem, they are not reacting the way they should, considering that their very lives are at stake. The spirit of public good that saw numerous people going to court against polluting industry has been snuffed out after implementing agencies failed to enact the orders of the courts.

A way out?
Michael Mazgaonkar says the only way out of the present situation is to have a very democratic system of permitting industries: "If we can ensure this along with easy access to information, we can reduce the problem to a great extent. We have adequate environmental rules that, if implemented properly, can control most of the industrial hazards. But the industries have found ways to circumvent these rules. So even if all these rules are implemented and the decision-making is not democratic, the problem is likely to continue," he feels.

"The problem can only be dealt with if good ngos and people take up the issue seriously. If community-based organisations come up, then some improvement can be made in the present situation," says Trivedi. C J Jose, member secretary of gec, has another view: "To protect their trade at the international level, these industries will be forced to comply with international environmental norms."

Gujarat clearly needs direction today when it comes to environmental governance. The civil society is faced with a huge task. The first thing to do, however, is to involve rural communities and industrial workers in the struggle against pollution. That being done, solutions will emerge. But if that is not done, then the cesspool is only going to worsen.

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CHEMICALS ALERT

Until the 1980s, Bharatbhai Bhagat, a farmer who lives a kilometre away from the Sarigam Industrial Estate (sie) in Valsad district of Gujarat, had 600 mango trees. He had been selling 10 truckloads of mangoes every year. "Today, we have to buy the fruit, even for our own consumption," he says. Bhagat's story is no different from those living in villages near sie. The 450-odd industrial units, including 50 chemical units, have in 12 years contaminated the groundwater. And if villagers are to be believed, some units even use borewells to pump untreated effluents into the ground.

A recent Greenpeace study shows that groundwater in Sarigam is contaminated with organic pollutants such as tri-chloroethane, benzene and several organochlorine compounds. Benzene is a known carcinogen and dichlorobenzene is a persistent organic pollutant, which remains in the environment for a very long period of time.

Groundwater is the only source of drinking water for the villagers. "But use of groundwater results in health problems, ruins our crops and the land as well," says Prakash B Arekar, former sarpanch (head) of Sarigam village council. Arekar, along with fellow villagers, has been has been trying to bring to task industrial units responsible for contamination but without success.

A 1986-87 incident explains their failure. Seventy-year-old blind farmer Ganeshbhai Ambali's 1.2-hectare land was completely destroyed after untreated effluents from Ami Chemicals spilled onto his fields. "The company official offered me money. He said that was all I would get. He also said that since he controlled 32 inspectors of the pollution control board, I was small fry," recalls Ambali.

The current controversy over Sabero Organics, which deals with chemicals, is also a case in point. According to Rajendra Singh Jadeja, vice-president of the Sarigam Industrial Association, Sabero had been caught red-handed dumping untreated effluents in the open. The Gujarat Pollution Control Board served a closure notice to Sabero in 1999. The company is now seeking permission to set up a unit to manufacture the fungicide mancozeb. Anand Mazgaonkar of the Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti, a non-governmental organisation, says production of this fungicide has been banned in several industrialised countries in view of the health risk it poses: "Its usage could adversely affect the central nervous system and is a suspected endocrine disrupter."

In a public hearing held at the collector's office in Valsad on March 31, 1999, 100-odd people protested against Sabero's decision to set up the plant. However, some questioned the very idea of calling a public hearing when almost 60 per cent construction of the proposed plant had been completed.

"We have been cheated by our own representatives," says Arekar. In 1983, the Gujarat Industrial Development Corporation (gidc) acquired land in Sarigam for setting up the industrial estate . " Politicians played mischief with us. They had said there would only be engineering units in the area ," says Bhagat .But they declared it a chemicals zone."Now our area has become like a multi-storeyed building without any latrines and bathrooms," says Arekar."But we have to fight .Our future generation will curse us if we do not protect the environment now," he adds.

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Fighting against pollution

It has been a long struggle for the people living in the villages of Sajod, Pungam, Matiad and Haripura in Bharuch district of Gujarat. The Amlakhadi river -- which was one of the sources of water for these villages -- has today become an effluent channel.

For several years, more than 1,500 industrial units in Jhagadia, Ankleshwar, Panoli, Vilayat and Dahej of Bharuch district have been discharging effluents into the Amlakhadi. The river meets the Narmada river near Bharuch. More than half of them are chemical units that manufacture dyes, paints, fertilisers, pharmaceuticals, industrial chemicals, paper and pesticides.

The 1994-95 annual report of the Gujarat Pollution Control Board (gpcb) says that the chemical oxygen demand (cod) level in the Amlakhadi river is 11,007 milligramme /litre (mg/l) when the prescribed gpcb level is only 250 mg/l. Even the biological oxygen demand (bod), which stands at 442 mg/l, far exceeds the gpcb limit of 30 mg/l. Moreover, a study conducted by environment pressure group, Greenpeace, has found toxic metals such as lead, mercury, chromium and zinc in the effluents released into the Amlakhadi. During monsoon, the effluents sometimes overflow and destroy the farmlands.

For many years the villagers have been protesting against the poisoning of the river. In December 1996, the Centre for Environment, Science and Community (cescom), a Vadodara-based non-governmental organisation (ngos), helped the villagers bring the struggle onto the negotiation table with the government. "We held a series of discussions with the district collector, officials from the Gujarat Industrial Development Corporation (gidc) and representatives from the industries. Later it was decided that no new units would be allowed in the Jhagadia Industrial Estate, except the existing four units unless an effluents pipeline was laid down for Ankleshwar, Panoli and Jhagadia estates. This pipeline was supposed to take effluents from these estates directly into the sea," says Ashok Rathi, secretary, cescom.

But when the gidc allowed more industries to come up in Jhagadia even before the pipeline was laid, Jayesh Patel, a member of Narmada Pradushan Nivaran Samiti, an organisation associated with cescom, filed a public interest litigation (pil) in the Gujarat high court. The Ankleshwar Industrial Association (aia) estimates that its members generate between 250-270 million litres per day (mld) of effluents. Of this 58 per cent is generated from the manufacture of dyes and dye intermediates; 10 per cent from drugs and pharmaceuticals; and five per cent from inorganic chemicals, says a 1996 Central Pollution Control Board report.

However, many industrial units claim to have installed effluent treatment plants. There is a common effluent treatment plant (cetp), backed by United Phosphorus Limited (upl) which has nearly 192 members. The cetp has a capacity to treat around 1,000 cubic metres of effluents per day or 1 mld. The industrial units are also planning a 55-km long pipeline project that will discharge effluents from Ankleshwar, Panoli and Jagadia into the sea. This pipeline will take the effluents 14 km inside the sea.

"The high court had passed an interim order two years ago asking the industrial units to stop dumping effluents. However, the units have not stopped dumping," says Rathi. "After this judgement, no new industry will be allowed in the area to discharge effluents in Amlakhadi until the gpcb develops norms in compliance with Section 17-1-K of the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act of 1974, as laid down by the court," adds Rathi.

"We had brought to the notice of the high court that the Water Act section 17-1-(K) allows consent to be given only subject to tolerance limits of the stream where discharge is to be made ," he says . Thus the decision of the high court upholding the stand taken by GIDC in not allowing any other industry to discharge effluent before the pipeline is commissioned remained in force during full period of litigation , Rathi adds.

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Western tragedy

"Industrialisation is a national priority and it has to take place. In Maharashtra we have demonstrated that industrialisation would bring prosperity," says Sharad Pawar, former chief minister of Maharashtra who has been an important player in national politics as well. "We have been able to concentrate on industrialisation consistently and thus there is a mad rush among the industries to set up their plant in Maharashtra," he says with a proud air. What he says is not untrue. But what Pawar's statement hides is another story.

The state of the national economy can be gauged from Maharashtra. It generates the highest amount of tax revenue and has the highest gross domestic product (gdp) among all the states. A recent survey by a business magazine identified it as the most investment friendly state of the country. Even before India's independence, it was the most industrialised state, accounting for half of national cotton and sugar production at the time. Its capital Mumbai -- known as the business capital of India -- hosts almost half of the industrial units in the state. The Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (midc) has created 265 industrial estates. Officials in the state industry department say that industrialists are more powerful here than the chief minister.

"Maharashtra's coast has a well developed petroleum industry, which attracts different chemicals units. Besides, the state unofficially projected the sea as a free dumping ground for these hazardous industrial units," says Rashmi Patil, professor at the Centre for Environmental Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai. "The state is well connected to the international market through air and sea. Chemicals industry, which thrives on the export market, is more interested in Maharashtra and Gujarat," she adds. Maharashtra accounts for one-fourth of the national annual turnover of the chemicals sector.

All the industrial superlatives do not come without a cost. As industrialisation started resulting in high gdp and revenues, the state began paying a heavy cost in terms of environmental degradation, particularly due to the massive concentration of the chemicals industry. The Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (mpcb) points out that the air of almost every major town of the state is unsuitable for breathing. The health costs due to this run into several crore rupees. The state has been reporting the highest number of accidents related to chemicals since 1985, followed by Gujarat, according to the Union ministry of environment and forests (mef). mpcb indicates that 80 per cent of the units in the state pollute water, while 15 per cent pollute the air. Of the 83,000 industrial units in the state, 50 per cent are in the chemicals, fertilisers and textiles sectors.

After using virtually every inch of space in cramped urban areas like Mumbai, the state government is now taking industrial development to rural areas. "That is industrialisation's final assault on the state," says Shanta Chatterji, an environmentalist working with Clean Air Island, an ngo working campaigning for clean air. "The industrial growth is based on outdated technology and without any respect to the environment. This had definitely resulted in environmental degradation," says Rashmi Mayur of the International Institute for Sustainable Future, who is involved in many environmental cases in the Mumbai High Court.

Recession increases pollution
The Indian economy has not been in the best of shapes for the past two-three years. Its effects can be seen clearly in Maharashtra, the most industrialised state of the country. One would imagine that an economic slump would result in less pollution. Incorrect. In face of the economic recession, more and more industrial units are failing in pollution control norms. To save money and reduce the cost of production, industrialists are not investing in pollution control machinery.

MPCB carried out a survey from April 1995 to March 1999 to identify units without adequate pollution control devices. "Almost all industries on banks of rivers or drinking water sources were found inadequate in pollution control measures," says an official involved with the survey. According to K H Mehta, member secretary of mpcb, industrialists are totally against pollution control norms as such and the economic recession has just provided the right excuse. "The economic recession has adversely affected the industrial sector and the government is trying hard to bring in more investments," says T N Mahadevan, scientist with the Bhaba Atomic Research Centre and secretary of the Society for Clean Air, a Mumbai-based ngo.

Small-scale chemicals industrial units of Mumbai, the first to be hit by the economic recession, are now being used by big chemicals factories outside Mumbai for illegal discharge of their untreated effluents into the sea. It helps the sick small-scale industrial units earn some quick money. In recent years, it has been seen that chemicals factories in remote areas of Maharashtra, who do not want to spend much on effluent treatment, are selling their effluents as 'chemicals' to these sick units, which, in turn, dump the effluents into the sea. "This is a very organised crime and basically aimed at saving money on pollution control," says Mehta. "There are reports of factories in Gujarat dumping their effluents in Mumbai through sick companies that earn around Rs 4,000-5,000 per tanker of effluent disposed," says another mpcb official.

Though the state government has done precious little to control this, it is doing its best to further promote industrialisation. According to the state's industry department, the financial allocation of midc has been increased and it is embarking on a major land acquisition drive in the backward areas of the state. It is rumoured that the corporation is acquiring 30,000 hectare of land. But there are no funds for pollution control. Six thermal power plants are yet to install pollution control measures. "We cannot blame them as the government does not provide the fund for pollution control machinery," says Mehta. The state government has stopped fresh recruitment to the board. A mere 150 technical mpcb officers are responsible for monitoring some 80,000 industrial units.

MIDC and industrial hell-holes
You go to any industrial estate of midc, you would find the same situation: either the river besides it is polluted or the residents of the area are suffering from several kinds of illnesses. Effluent flowing in open drains, careless dumping of hazardous waste and emission of poisonous gases are the common features of midc estates.

The Thane-Belarpur industrial area (tbia), the largest industrial estate in the country with a turnover of above Rs 4,000 crore, provides the real picture of industrialisation in Maharashtra. Situated along the Thane creek, its 40 per cent area is occupied by more than 1,200 industrial units. The effluents from these are drained into the creek after partial treatment. Some 25,000 cubic metre of wastewater from the factories is dumped into the sea everyday. The Ecology and Environment Inc of New York, usa, conducted a study on the tbia for the Maharashtra government in 1995. It points out that "some wastewater is discharged with minimal or no treatment". The effluents score quite high on several pollution parameters, and studies have traced heavy metal like lead and cadmium in the Thane creek.

In Chembur, industrial units discharge some 500,000 cubic metre of industrial wastewater to the Thane lower creek. Sandip Rane, a cardiologist and the president of Chembur's Smoke Affected Residents' Forum, says, "While vehicular pollution has peaked in Mumbai, industrial pollution is adding to it. Chembur is simply hell. The health impact must be serious, though no comprehensive study has been done on this." According to an estimate of the Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research (igidr), poor air quality costs people living in Chembur as much as Rs 35 lakh each year. Moreover, they have to avail of free government services like hospitals and municipal services worth Rs 20 lakh. No wonder the property rates have fallen in Chembur.

Solid waste: hazardous dilemma
Mumbai, with a population of about 10 million, produces more than 5,000 tonnes of solid waste per year. There are 40,000 small- and large-scale industrial units in the city, 523 of them in the chemicals sector, 531 in textiles and 9 deal with pesticides. One-fourth of the solid waste generated in Mumbai is toxic, according to the Environmental Status of Mumbai, a publication of the Greater Mumbai Municipality Corporation.

Maharashtra generates 195,000 tonnes of hazardous waste per year through 3,908 industrial units. This is supposed to be managed by midc. Though there has been a move to identify eight dumping sites, only one is operational. "Three years have passed since the government decided to allocate land for it. But we are yet to see any other sites except the one operating near the Thane-Belarpur estate," says Mahadevan.

Rivers: weeping black tears
MPCB says 75 per cent of the rivers in the state are polluted by industry. If you want to know the state of the Mulla river near Pune, speak to Rahim Muqbal Sheikh, a commercial painter. He spends his evenings on the bank of the Mulla. "I come here just to get a feel of the river," he says. The 35-year-old Sheikh is a key witness to Mulla's slow death. He has seen fish, the water crystal clear and its ferocity during monsoon. "The vibrant fishing community has disappeared with the fish," says Prakash Gole of the ngo Ecological Society.

Since the 1970s, Pimpri, one of India's premier industrial estates, has taken its toll. The river is so polluted that it is not even suitable for survival of crabs, considered some of the toughest creatures when it comes to surviving water pollution, says Gole. A 1997 study by the University of Pune observed that the water of the river just before entered Pimpri was potable, while at the point it left Pimpri, it was highly polluted.

The fate of Patalganga river is no better. The river flows besides the industrial area called Rasayani (which means chemicals in Hindi/Marathi) in Khapoli town of Raigad district. The Society for Clean Environment, a Mumbai-based ngo which has conducted a survey of the area, estimates that more than 15 million litres of highly polluted effluents are discharged into the river everyday. In January 1988, the executive engineers at Panvel examined the water at the intake point of the Chauna water supply scheme, which dams the river water for supply, and declared it unfit for human consumption, stripping 42 villages with 45,000 people of their only water source.

Since 1972, local residents have been protesting sporadically against the government and the industry. In 1988 the Bombay Environmental Action Group (beag) filed a public interest petition. In 1987 the villagers alleged that due to flushing of chemical residue into the river, the water had become acidic and it burnt crops in field. The state government and the pollution control board never gave any importance to this allegation. The Mumbai zonal laboratory of the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (neeri) finally exposed the government's ignorance. It after examination of the sample of water supplied from the Chauna water supply scheme observed that the water required proper disinfection and remarked that the water was unfit for drinking. The villagers reported large-scale mortality of fish in 1988.

The state government denied any pollution in the area and even defended the industrial units. The Maharashtra Pollution Control Board denied that the water of the Patalganga river had become wholly unfit for human consumption due to pollution. The court set up an expert committee to ascertain the truth. It said that the mpcb needs to be more vigilant in monitoring the industrial units. The case is still going on in the high court since. Though the Mehta of mpcb says that all the industrial units in the area are pollution free now, the river still looks 'faint green' and villagers protest saying that there is a nexus between the industrialists and pcb members.

What has aggravated the problem is the Tata Hydro Electric Power Station at Khopoli, which blocks the river flow to generate electricity for Mumbai. Some five years ago the flow in the river came to such a low that it was not even flushing away the effluents discharged by factories, turning it to an effluent drain. The petition of the beag said that "the peaking power requirement for Bombay city is not more important than drinking water for about 100,000 people".

Why isn't there any attention?

The rivers are polluted. The sea is polluted up to five km. Agriculture has become less productive in many industrial areas. Yet there is hardly any notable movement or protest against industrial pollution. And if there is any, it either fizzles out in face of an insensitive government or people involved abandon it half way. "Except jeevan sanghrash (the battle to survive), there is no other battle in the state," says Tulsidas Mishra, a resident of Mumbai. "In the past decade environment pollution cases are getting highlighted due to public interest litigation. But we are yet to boast of a major environmental movement," says Debi Goenka.

One reason for it comes from Ashish Kothari of the Pune-based ngo Kalpavriksha: "The stagnation in agriculture and spread of drought encouraged industrialisation. The state is depending more on industry now. A large portion of the population is working in industries, so a sustained movement against it is really difficult."

As part of its economic reformation, the state government has waived the mandatory permission of the district collector before converting agriculture land into industrial use. According to people of Marbad village in Thane, this has contributed to pollution. As agricultural lands in drought-prone areas are unproductive, many industrial houses are buying these lands at throwaway prices. "It's easier to pollute in rural areas given the level of awareness among the village folk," says Shanta Chatterjee.

In its annual review report, mpcb says: "On the industrial front, a licensing policy was pursued which prohibited industrial production of a large number of products beyond a particular capacity. This also prohibited the industries from achieving scale of economical production and setting up of pollution abatement plants with a zero pollution concept, these being unviable."

But Mahadevan says the absence of public opinion on these issues is due to the ineffectiveness of the agencies concerned: "It is really very difficult to find any data on the environmental status. mpcb doesn't come out with any study or survey on the state's rivers or air pollution. So the people do not have strong base to contest the powerful industrial lobby." On his part, Mehta defends mpcb: "We do not have that kind of resources to monitor." Says Mahadevan: "There is no independent source of information and the credibility of mpcb is suspected due to government pressures." Goenka, who is fighting the case against pollution of the Patalganga river, says, "Lack of information and the officials hesitation in giving you the available information are major hurdles that one would face while fighting pollution in the state. Apart from the court room, I was fighting a battle outside -- for more information on the water quality."

From here, whence?

Maharashtra was the first state in India to have water pollution control legislation in India in 1970. In the same year, mpcb was established. Although there are elaborate provisions in the law, factories continue polluting. "Implementation is zero," says Goenka. In its review of all the cases pending in the courts, mpcb says there was no effective control on containing the pollution in the intervening period. To curb this, it has started asking for bank guarantee from the industrial units, which would enable the board to force the industries to adhere to pollution control norms within the stipulated time frame.

It said that the laws are based on a command and control regime with an emphasis on punitive rather than pro-active and preventive measures. Undue emphasis is placed on criminal procedure. "We cannot close a unit for more than a week or, say, for 15 days. Beyond that we get pressure from political leadership," says Mehta. "Due to the nexus between politicians and industrialists, factories have been given unprecedented freedom; even the freedom of degrading our environment," says Chatterjee. "Industrial houses appease politicians by giving them construction contracts and in return they get very little punishment for their crimes," says Rashmi Mayur. "The process of taking industry to the court is torturous and drags on for years. We have cases which are pending since 20 years."

Jyoti Parikh of igidr says, "The government has to now adopt the 'polluters pay' method apart from having a policy of encouraging environment friendly industry with economic incentives." The most industrialised state of India direly needs an overhaul of the way it perceives environmental pollution. Otherwise its workers like Gokul Rao and Aniruddha Mohanty will continue to live a miserable life till a more miserable deaths relieves them. The chances of the politicians waking up to address this cause are quite faint, although they have the power. Now, it is up to the civil society to become more powerful. It can make a small beginning by compiling all the information available in the state on industrial pollution. Knowledge is the ultimate power. It is also the only tool for the civil society.

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Survival in a chemical dustbin

Dombivli is an industrial township in Thane district of Maharashtra. Any taxi driver can point it out to you from a distance. This small town with a big industrial estate, comprising some 50 chemicals units manufacturing dye intermediaries, is perpetually engulfed in smog. For the 100,000 residents, life is worse than hell. "The factories emit gases at night. They discharge effluents openly into the drain passing through our colony. Any complaint against them will only mean that we lose our jobs," laments Saroj Panicker, a resident of Dombivli, whose father works in a chemicals factory.

Though the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (midc) is supposed to establish a common effluent treatment plant (cetp) and the industrial units have to treat their effluents, visits to at least 15 units showed that they discharge effluents in open drains. Hazardous wastes in the shape of a sludge are dumped in open fields besides residential colonies.

"When it rains the rainwater brings these chemicals in our houses," says Renuka Patil, whose house is next door to a factory manufacturing chemicals for a fertiliser plant. S P Ahire, a local physician who treats people from within the industrial area, says the most common problems are respiratory and skin disorders.

The Maharashtra Pollution Control Board says the air quality here is as poor as Chembur and central Mumbai. But pollution here is solely due to industries. "The town has become a huge dumping ground for chemicals units operating on obsolete technology," says Rashmi Mayur, director of the International Institute for Sustainable Future, Mumbai, who recently conducted a survey in the area.

In the residential areas surrounding the industrial estates, people keep their windows and doors bolted at night. There is a fear that factories may discharge poisonous gases. "Once my husband fainted suddenly after opening the windows at night," says Manisha Dubey, a resident. A senior scientific officer who does not want to be named says: "There are no official complaints from any residents. But we know for certain that some factories release gases like chlorine. As the area is densely populated this could be hazardous for human health, even fatal," But all official working in the plants only reiterated one line:" There is no pollution control board has certified this." The owner of a factory inside the estate says factories release gases at the same time, maiking it impossible for any official on inspection to identify the culprit.