The Supreme Court on Monday stayed a part of the National Green Tribunal (NGT)’s order that had asked the Uttar Pradesh Pollution Control Board (UPPCB) to initiate criminal prosecution against the owners of elevator manufacturer ECE Industries, which allegedly has a polluting plant in Ghaziabad. The NGT on August 8 had directed closure of 124 industrial units which were polluting the Hindon river and its two tributaries that flow through six districts of western UP. The green tribunal had also ordered that the owners of these units be prosecuted.
A Bench led by Justice RF Nariman, while seeking response from the Centre, the Uttar Pradesh government and others, also stayed “operation of Para 9 of the judgment and the NGT order of August 8, 2018 … insofar as the appeal of the appellant is concerned.”
Senior counsel Gopal Subramanium and counsel Ajay Bhargava, appearing for ECE, argued that no opportunity of being heard was given by the NGT before directing shutting down of the company’s plant allegedly for dumping of mercury, asking the UPPCB to punish those responsible for causing pollution, initiating prosecution against the owners and recovering the cost of damage to the environment. ECE was also asked to stop manufacturing activities at its Ghaziabad unit under the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1974.
While the original petition pertained to industries causing pollution in river waters in the districts of Saharanpur, Baghpat, Ghaziabad, Muzzafarnagar, Shamli and Meerut in Uttar Pradesh, the NGT during the hearing directed constitution of a joint inspection committee to submit a report of all the industries in the catchment of the Hindon and its tributaries in order to analyze the role of each industry in contributing to the contaminants of surface and ground water, ECE said in its appeal.
A Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB)-led joint team of officials, formed on the directions of the tribunal, had in July found groundwater sampling locations in western UP districts were contaminated with pollutants and heavy metals like cadmium, copper, lead, iron, nickel, zinc, mercury, chromium and manganese.
While the panel had found that effluents discharged from the company’s effluent treatment plant were in excess of the parameters prescribed in law, no discharge of mercury was found.
The counsel submitted that there is extreme variance between the joint inspection committee report and the two reports of Enviro Tech Services and NEERI, both accredited government-recognized agencies. “It appears that an error had crept in the joint inspection report where the joint inspection team had to analyse 1,166 samples of 317 industries within a span of 15 days,” the company said.
According to the company, the NEERI’s September 6 report found acceptable parameters of pollutants at the company’s plant.
