MARGAO
The expert committee constituted to go into the illegal borewells dug at the fish meal and processing units at the Cuncolim Industrial Estate has recommended that the Goa State Pollution Control Board penalize the units responsible for causing damage to the environment, even as a GSPCB team was in Cuncolim on Tuesday to unearth the illegal borewells and seal the same.
In its draft report submitted to the GSPCB, the expert committee has suggested that the Pollution Control Board, with reference to the Central Pollution Control Board’s guidelines for implementing liabilities for environmental damages due to handling and disposal of hazardous waste, should penalize the industries appropriately considering the discharge of untreated hazardous wastewater into the ground.
GSPCB Member Secretary Dr Shamila Monteiro said the Board is in receipt of the draft report from the expert committee, adding that the Board will take appropriate action by following the process. “It is a process and the Board will wait for the final report before initiating action,” Monteiro said.
When asked to shed light on the GSPCB’s presence at the fish meal and processing plants on Tuesday along with the demolition squad and police, Monteiro said the demolition squad was requisitioned by the Board not to raze down any structures, but to excavate illegal borewells, if any, dug by the units.
“Today, the GSPCB had visited the fish meal and fish processing units to unearth the illegal borewells and seal them. I am waiting for a report from my team which was there on the ground at the estate,” she said added, “The Board will initiate necessary action, including penalizing the units, after compiling the reports.”
Meanwhile, the expert committee, in its draft report submitted to the GSPCB, asserted that since the Goa Industrial Development Corporation (GIDC) has not provided infrastructure such as wastewater sewer lines, Common Effluent Treatment plant, it is very much necessary for individual units in the Cuncolim Industrial Estate to provide treatment to wastewater generated in the units as per the GSPCB’s specifications.
The expert committee has pointed out that it is quite likely that the untreated wastewater from the units with a high concentration of organics and nitrogen was discharged into the ground on the premises or elsewhere from 2012 till 2019 for unavailability of infrastructure to treat the wastewater.
Moreover, the committee has called for a detailed investigation on the treatment of effluent discharged and used since the review of documents revealed there’s no data to confirm that the units are achieving Zero Liquid Discharge.
