Ludhiana: Act tough against industries to save Buddha Nullah, say environmentalists

Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann’s decision to hire a new firm to clean the Buddha Nullah in a mission mode has evoked criticism from environmentalists and activists, who had been waging a war on pollution to restore the original status of the Sutlej tributary as Buddha Dariya.

They have questioned the move at a time when the Rs 840-crore Buddha Nullah rejuvenation project was already in progress.

“Politicians in power and polluters cannot go hand-in-hand. To confront, stop and eradicate pollution, the politicians in power have to look into the eye of the polluters and stare them down and not appease them as has been the case till now,” the activists felt.

They also commented that the solution to the Buddha Nullah pollution, proposed by the CM, was a mere PR stunt.

“The Buddha Nullah could not be cleaned till the time the industries of all types of dyeing, electroplating, sheet metal and others using chemicals stop putting polluted water in the sewerage system, which further goes to STPs and CETPs of dyeing units’ treated water, having heavy metals, which did not meet the treated output water benchmark, and discharged into the nullah and the Sutlej directly,” Col Jasjit Gill (retd) said.

Colonel Gill, who has been spearheading a sustained campaign to free the Buddha Nullah of pollution, said the flow of illegal chemical cocktail pollution of sewer waters by all types of the industry should be blocked.

“Also, there is a need to find out reverse boring of polluted water into the Ludhiana groundwater by the industries as was being done at the Zira ethanol plant,” he asserted.

He demanded that all types of industries must treat their polluted waters on their premises at their own cost or through CETPs to meet the CPCB/PPCB standards of treated water for different industries. “We cannot spend public money to clean their polluted water,” he quipped.

Colonel Gill, who was a former member of the state task force on the Buddha Nullah Rejuvenation Project, remarked that if the industry was given a licence to pollute as much as they could and the government would keep cleaning their polluted waters by spending public funds, it would amount to huge continuous wastage of public funds for centuries to come and the result would be zero.

“The industries should be strictly asked to go for zero liquid discharge technology on the lines of the dyeing industry in Tirupur (Tamil Nadu), which has already adopted it,” he demanded, adding that the industry must spend to adhere to no pollution of surface and groundwater, air and soil as laid down in various environment protection rules.

Colonel Gill also questioned the track record of the hired new firm, Nebula, in tackling such levels of chemical and heavy metal pollution. “Why the government is not disclosing the cost of the new project and other companies were not allowed to participate in the project,” he asked.

Padma Bhushan Sardara Singh Johl, a renowned agriculture economist, said, “There is no need to put money and effort in cleaning the Buddha Nullah. Come down with a strong hand on polluters, fine them heavily and make them stop polluting the Sutlej.”

Having served as Chancellor of the Central University of Punjab, professor of agricultural economics of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research, VC of Punjabi University and the PAU, besides chairing the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices set up by the Central Government, Prof Johl said if the flow of pollution was stopped, the Sutlej tributary would clean by itself with a few spells of rain.

“Politicians and administration will not do it as the polluters have lot of money and that suits all of these worthies,” felt Prof Johl, who was awarded the third highest civilian honour of Padma Bhushan in 2004, for his contributions to agriculture and agriculture education sectors.

The ‘Kale Pani Da Morcha’, a movement launched by environmentalists and activists against widespread pollution in the Buddha Nullah, has questioned why should the people of the state wait for experiments when already it was already an emergency situation?

An activist of the movement, Kapil Arora, said: “Experiments done by earlier governments failed badly. Jairam Ramesh had come up with green bridges which wasted a lot of time of the people of Punjab and also taxpayers’ money. Why should people waste more time on such experiments?”

“Which river of this scale and level of pollution has been cleaned by the Nebula Group using this solution till now? Which expert has recommended this solution to the government for nullah?” asked another environmentalist, Kuldeep Singh Khaira.

Activist Jaskirat Singh questioned that why was the CM dithering over implementing the basic rule of law on the Buddha Nullah issue and not closing down all illegal industries and stopping others from throwing untreated waste into the water body?

“Why Punjab is not implementing ZLD for red category industries even today when Tamil Nadu implemented it in 2011-12 itself?” asked Public Action Committee member Amandeep Singh Bains.

The Chief Minister had on Friday announced to embark on a three-phase multi-pronged programme to clean the Buddha Nullah on a mission mode. Mann had announced that the current campaign would be started in collaboration with the Nebula Group and aim at cleaning the nullah to remove impurities that cause cancer, with the help of the Nebula Ozonation technology at the nano-level. He had said the target wouldbe to reduce TDS level of water to below 100, making it fit for drinking purposes.