MP pollution control board 'misleading' people on Carbide waste disposal, alleges Pithampur Bachao Samiti

Indore: An organisation opposing the incineration of toxic waste from the Union Carbide factory at a unit in Pithampur on Friday accused the Madhya Pradesh Pollution Control Board of "misleading" people on the ongoing trial burning of the material in the industrial town.

The Pithampur Bachao Samiti alleged the board is not making public the complete report of the ongoing trial incineration of Union Carbide's waste at the disposal plant of a private firm in Pithampur in adjoining Dhar district.

The outfit said it will soon approach the Madhya Pradesh High Court with a plea to stop the eight-day-long trial of burning the waste brought from Union Carbide's defunct factory in Bhopal, the site of the 1984 industrial disaster, to Pithampur, located 250km from the state capital.

The pollution control board has consistently maintained that during the trial, all emission levels have remained within standard limits, while the state administration has allayed fears of any adverse impact on the health of local residents.

The second round of waste burning trial is currently going on at the disposal site. As part of a plan to dispose of 337 tonnes of waste from the Union Carbide factory in Bhopal, the material was transported to Pithampur on January 2.

According to an order of the HC, the trial of disposal of this waste is to be done in three rounds while strictly following safety norms and a report is to be submitted before it on March 27. In each round of trial, 10 tonnes of waste is to be disposed of. The first round concluded on March 3 and the second phase is underway since March 6.

Addressing a press conference in Indore, Hemant Kumar Hirole, head of the Pithampur Bachao Samiti, said, "The State Pollution Control Board is not making public the complete report of the ongoing trial of the Union Carbide waste burning at Pithampur's disposal plant. The board is misleading people. It has also not disclosed the status of the ashes and other residues left after burning the waste." He said his organisation will soon file a petition with "facts" in the HC and request it to halt the ongoing trial.

Hirole claimed that ever since the exercise started, local residents in Pithampur have complained of burning sensation in eyes, pain in the throat and dryness in mouth.

However, the board has insisted all emissions caused by the incineration are within standard limits.

Indore division commissioner Deepak Singh said during the trial disposal of the chemical waste, the health department examined the health parameters of people living in settlements around the incineration facility and all their test reports have been found to be normal.

He said as part of the second round of trial, the process of putting waste in the incinerator began on Thursday (March 6) and it is estimated that 10 tonnes of waste will take about 55 hours to burn.

According to the pollution control board, in the first round of disposal of Union Carbide factory's waste, the emission of particulate matter (PM), sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, carbon monoxide, hydrogen chloride, hydrogen fluoride and total organic carbon from the Pithampur plant was found to be within standard limits.

On the intervening night of December 2 and 3, 1984, highly toxic methyl isocyanate gas (MIC) leaked from the Union Carbide's pesticide factory in Bhopal. At least 5,479 people were killed, while thousands others suffered physical disabilities in the world's worst industrial disaster.

According to the state government, the waste from the Union Carbide factory includes soil from the premises of the closed unit, reactor residues, sevin (pesticide) residues, naphthal residues and "semi-processed" residues.

The board said according to scientific evidence, the effect of sevin and naphthal chemicals in this waste has now become "almost negligible". Methyl isocyanate gas is currently non-existent in this waste and it is also free of radioactive particles, it asserted.