NGT notice on single-use plastic to state, Jalandhar

The National Green Tribunal has issued notice to Punjab, the Punjab Pollution Control Board, DC, Jalandhar, the Jalandhar Municipal Corporation, Directorate of Environment and Climate Change, Punjab, and the Central Pollution Control Board, New Delhi, during a hearing on October 25 in a case filed by the Action Group Against Plastic

Pollution, a Jalandhar NGO. Despite a ban on single-use plastic manufacture, distribution, sale and use, there has been uncontrolled use of single use plastic in different forms, as per the NGT notice which has asked the respondents to file their replies before the next hearing in the case.

Dr Pallavi Khanna, president, AGAPP working committee, expressed joy on the success of the AGAPP’s three-year-old campaign to rid Jalandhar and Punjab of the single-use plastic curse.

Khanna said, “We mentioned in our NGT petition the lack of response to the AGAPP’s multiple pleas and protests to the Municipal Corporation, PPCB, and Local Bodies Ministry since 2021. We have sent letters and emails to the CM for a meeting to hear us but not been heard. We also mentioned in our petition about the political interference by MLAs’ which we have openly witnessed when attempting challan enforcement in our targeted areas in Jalandhar. Our plea to the NGT also demanded from the administration public notices via print and visual media to inform citizens of the harms from single use plastic, starting from its manufacture to use to disposal. We pointed to the massive solid waste management problem arising from this disposable plastic culture.”

Dr Khanna appreciated lawyers who framed and argued for this petition for the AGAPP - advocate Varun Girdhar, advocate Subhagya Liberhan as well as the guidance of Kapil Arora of the Public Action Committee, Mattewara.

“The health harms of nano-plastics to humans and other animals are being highlighted almost daily in scientific and nature journals worldwide. This is just a start. We are ready and restless to extend this enforcement petition for the single use plastic ban beyond Punjab. We are pooling resources with our activists in Delhi as well as other environment organisations to take this litigation nationwide,” said Dr Navneet Bhullar, co-founder AGAPP, who has organised multiple protests in the Jalandhar Municipal Corporation, Ludhiana PPCB office and Municipal Corporation office sites, Patiala (PPCB headquarters) and Chandigarh (Local Body Ministry) since November 2021 and failed to get any results.