Months after the Supreme Court passed a verdict levying 17 crore fine against Hema Chemicals for Chromium dumping, another case gathers momentum.

The Golden Corridor, a chemical industry belt set along the Western Express Highway between Vapi and Ahmedabad, a distance of over 200 kms, was created as a tax haven for the industry by the Gujarat government about 20 years ago. Financiers recovering from Bombay's textile strike quickly jumped onto the bandwagon and with a very limited understanding of the chemistry involved, set up units and factories to manufacture some of the most dangerous man-made chemicals. Even as individual units and factories were shutting down, the pollution of land, air and water by the release of chemical compounds over these many years, has left a trail of ecological devastation.

Studies by Greenpeace show the effluents contain some of the most dangerous toxic chemicals known. Abundant harvests of cotton, sugarcane, peanuts and wheat are being poisoned by factory wastes. Once-clear streams like the Amlakhadi are now noxious and foul-smelling channels of black sludge which have killed livestock that drank from it. In the Golden Corridor multi-coloured hazardous waste lies in heaps on which children play. Discarded chemical drums are also part of their playground, while industrial gases hang in the air, especially in the winter, making breathing difficult.

One such plant is Hema Chemicals, which operates two plants on the estate, manufacturing potassium and sodium bichromate, basic chromium sulphate and other chromium-based chemicals widely used in alloy and metal plating, wood preservatives, coloured glass, glaze, textile dyes and pigments used in lithography. Numerous government and non-government agencies had been alleging that Hema Chemicals dumped thousands of tons of toxic waste. Since 1999, the Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti, a Gujarat-based environment and health group, and the People’s Union of Civil Liberties have continued to highlight the grave risks to Hema Chemical’s workers and the public at large through some letters and phone calls to the GPCB, the ministry of environment and forests, the Central Pollution Control Board and the Central Vigilance Commission.

After a long and protracted struggle, on August 13, 2004 , the Supreme Court’s Monitoring Committee (SCMC) directed Hema Chemicals to inspect the site where it had illegally dumped over 45,000 tonnes of extremely hazardous hexavalent chromium waste. The order directed the company to have the waste removed by an expert body. It instructed the National Institute of Occupational Health (NIOH) to conduct a medical study to evaluate the impact of unattended waste on the health of people living at the site, with a view to awarding damages. The court ordered Hema Chemicals to deposit Rs 17 crore towards the initial remediation work.

To date, however, Hema Chemicals has reportedly not deposited a single rupee.

The SCMC also indicts the Gujarat government and the Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB) for not moving expeditiously to halt this “careless, irresponsible and indiscriminate” dumping.

Today, workers and environmental groups have highlighted dumping by another company, this time in Maharastra – Golden Chemicals, in Dahisar.

The presently defunct Golden Chemicals Ltd. was once the largest manufacturer of Bichromates in the country and was functioning here since early 40s. It had severely polluted the ground water and soil around with highly carcinogenic hexavalent chromium, a toxic legacy left behind by the Golden Chemicals for the people of this area and their future generations. The dumping practice is in blatant violation of the Hazardous Wastes (Management and Handling) Rules, 1989.
Despite informing the authorities concerned (Maharashtra Pollution Control Board) with specific suggestions to curb the public health risk from the polluted ground water more than a month back, the situation has not become any better.

Water in the neighborhood is yellow with chromic salts, at over 50 times safe limits listed by the World Health Organization. Most of the workers have symptoms of severe occupational exposure to chromium such as nasal septum perforation, ulceration and dermatitis.

For the last few months the company has shut all operations – the workers have no idea of the cause. Local environmental groups believe it is the result of the supreme court’s verdict on Hema Chemicals.

The company has ignored all suggestions that it clean up the dumping sites. In addition, it has ignored all demands by workers for compensation of severe health problems owing to exposure to the chromium salts.

Local environmental groups along with workers continue to demand justice. Please call the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board or email them demanding Golden Chemicals clean up the site and compensate workers.

MPCB
Telephone - 022-24020781/24014701/24010437
Fax - 022-24024068
Email - mpcb@vsnl.net

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