The State Pollution Control Boards were created to control and monitor industrial enterprise. But they have facilitated the rush for industrialisation at the cost of environment, and are as much to blame as the polluting industries
Industrial areas throughout the country are synonymous with economic growth and employment. However, increasing pollution levels in these development zones are exceeding the limits and causing irreversible damage to the environment.
The problem is more pronounced in older industrial areas across India where inefficient planning coupled with lack of standard waste disposal facilities, is taking a heavy toll on the environment. The problems generated by ill-conceived and inefficiently-managed industrial areas take many forms, be it pollution of ground water, air pollution, noise pollution or exposure of the local people to the disposed industrial waste which are in the form of toxic carcinogens such as organochlorines and other persistent organic pollutants in the industrial effluents. This is unfortunate as people give up their precious land to the industrial estates, hoping for a better life and livelihood, only to trade deteriorating environment and threat to health and life in return.
Many industrial areas and special zones that dot the country today are creating a pollution nightmare for the State authorities as well. Take, for instance, the Cuncolim Industrial Estate in Goa. The Goa State Pollution Control Board had to go on an overdrive in April this year by issuing directions to the steel rolling mills at the Cuncolim industrial estate to ensure that the hazardous waste lying there is properly covered or shifted in a closed shed before the onset of rains.
Similarly, in Maharashtra, the Mumbai-Pune highway is home to hundreds of industrial units dealing with chemicals and fertilisers that dump their sludge along the roadside.
In the neighbouring State of Gujarat, the Kolak River in Southern Gujarat has borne the brunt of Vapi Industrial Estate. At Kolak village, about 15km away from the estate, many residents suffer from cancer as factories of the estate, which produce pesticides, agro-chemicals, organochlorine dyes and dye intermediates, have been dumping untreated effluents in the river. Kolak village, largely comprising the fishing community, relies on the fish from the river. Given the numerous instances of environmental ruin caused due to the inappropriate functioning of industrial areas, it is time to consider some proactive and bold steps to contain the ill-effects.
A welcome initiative, taken up by quite a few pollution control boards across the country, has been to set up ambient air monitoring stations at multiple places in the industrial estates to monitor and curb pollution there. However, the Government should explore the viability of adopting Wireless Sensor Network systems, used to monitor and control the air quality, as these are fast gaining popularity as opposed to the traditional air quality monitoring systems, operated by the Pollution Control Departments, which are expensive, time and power consuming, and can seldom be used for air quality reporting in real time.
Credible data pertaining to pollution status is very crucial and State Pollution Control Boards are the authentic source for the same. However, in many States such as Maharashtra, the fight against industrial pollution is made difficult by the absence of credible data due to lack of any thorough study on pollution done by the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board.
In order to empower the people and representative organisations, such as NGOs, to fight for the environmental cause, the Union Government should make these studies mandatory. The people and the activists can then have a strong baseline data to contest the powerful industry lobby.
Village panchayat and residents welfare associations around the industries should be made part of the local environmental panel that consists of State Pollution Control Board members and industry representatives as well. The panel should jointly supervise industrial operations and prevent violation of pollution norms. In addition to this, anti-dumping squads of local authorities need to be constituted which keep residential and community areas free from dumping of industrial sludge and chemical waste. The squads should be empowered to impound the tankers that ply mostly at night to illegally offload the toxic waste. Additionally, the mechanisms and equipment to dispose of waste need to be made affordable so that it makes more business sense to install them than attract penalty.
For the current state of affairs, the State Pollution Control Boards are as much to blame as the polluting industries. The SPCBs were created to control and monitor industrialisation. However, they have facilitated a mad rush for industrialisation at the cost of environment. Given the fact that Governments are biased towards industries, it is now up to the judiciary and social organisations to team up and tackle wayward industrialisation that has scant regard for the environment.