The Indian Express | 1 week ago | 18-03-2023 | 01:45 pm
Initiating suo motu proceedings on the recent fire at the Brahmapuram waste treatment plant in Kochi, the principal bench of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) on Friday imposed an environmental compensation of Rs 100 crore on the Kochi Municipal Corporation.The tribunal also directed the corporation to deposit the said amount with the state chief secretary within a month for necessary remedial measures, including public health issues faced by victims of the garbage fire. The compensation was imposed under Section 15 of The National Green Tribunal Act.Coming down heavily on the Kerala government, the tribunal said, “No accountability for such serious failure has been fixed and no senior person has been held accountable so far. Except for giving future plans, no fixing of accountability is proposed even now which is a matter of regret.”Spread over 100 acres of land, the Brahmapuram waste treatment plant is the dumping yard of Kochi. On March 2, mounds of garbage at the plant, including tonnes of plastic waste, caught fire. For 12 days, the waste kept smouldering, leaving a blanket of toxic haze over Kerala’s commercial capital.The NGT initiated suo motu proceedings on serious environmental emergencies caused due to the fire and served notices to the state chief secretary, state Pollution Control Board member secretary and the Kochi Municipal Corporation secretary on March 6.The tribunal, in its verdict, directed the Kerala chief secretary to fix accountability for such gross failure and to initiate action under criminal law as well as by way of departmental proceedings, following due process, and place the same in the public domain within two months.The tribunal bench comprising chairperson Justice Adarsh Kumar Goel, member Justice Sudhir Agarwal and expert member Dr A Senthil Vel recommended that “it is essential to establish modern solid waste treatment plants and clear the dump yards of wastes by bio-mining to separate combustible and inert material. The contaminated ash separated during bio-mining should be removed to a sanitary landfill. Given the widespread burning of waste and dump yard fires, analysis of dioxins in animal origin food samples such as milk, egg, meat and in human milk is recommended.”The NGT said the state authorities have been an “utter failure” and have rampantly violated the statutory solid waste management rules and orders of the Supreme Court and various orders of the tribunal from 2016 to 2022.The bench said, “No prosecution has been launched against the guilty for criminal offences under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 and also under relevant provisions of IPC nor action taken for violation of orders of the Supreme Court and repeated orders of this tribunal in proceedings transferred to the tribunal by the Supreme Court.”The tribunal said, “Such attitude of state authorities is threat to rule of law. We hope the situation is remedied at the higher level in the state such as the DGP and the chief secretary to uphold the Constitution and the mandate of environmental law.”
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