Ganga Pollution Cases

Ganga pollution cases: How Kanpur became the test case for environmental
legislation
The story of this court ruling began in 1985 in the pilgrimage city of
Haridwar, along the Ganga; a matchstick tossed by a smoker resulted in the
river catching on fire for more than 30 hours, due to the presence of a toxic
layer of chemicals produced by a pharmaceutical firm (Mehta 2009). In
response to this incident, environmental lawyer and social activist M.C.
Mehta filed a writ petition in the SC charging that government authorities
had not taken effective steps to prevent environmental pollution of the
waters of the Ganga. The scale of the case – the whole 2,500-km stretch of
the river – proved to be intractable. So the Court requested Mr. Mehta to
narrow down his focus and he chose the city of Kanpur, despite neither
being from the city nor living there. In Mehta’s words, “It (Kanpur) was in
the middle of the Ganga basin; the reddish colour of the pollution made the
pollution highly salient, and the city seemed representative of many other
cities in the Ganga Basin.” (Mehta 2014)[1]. A writ petition in the nature of
mandamus to prevent these leather tanneries from disposing off domestic
and industrial waste and effluents in the Ganga river was thus filed.
For more than 100 years, Kanpur has been a major center for India’s
tannery industry. Most of the tanneries are located in the neighbourhood of
Jajmau, which lies outside the main city on the southern bank of the
Ganga. The leather industry is highly polluting; the processes of washing,
liming, fleshing, tanning, splitting and finishing involve a large number of
chemicals. One tonne of hide generally leads to the production of 20-80
m3 of turbid and foul-smelling wastewater, including chromium levels of
100–400 mg/l, sulfide levels of 200–800 mg/l, high levels of fat and other
solid wastes, as well as significant pathogen contamination. Pesticides are
also often added for hide conservation during transport (Cheremisinoff
2001). Tannery effluent is generally characterised by its strong colour
(reddish or dull brown), high levels of biochemical oxygen demand (BOD),
high pH, and large amounts of dissolved solid wastes.
The 8-10 respondents in Mr. Mehta’s petition included all 75 tanneries of
the Jajmau district the Union of India, the Chair of the Central Pollution
Control Board (CPCB), the Chair of the Uttar Pradesh State Pollution
Control Board (SPCB), and the Indian Standards Institute. The petition also
claimed that the Municipal Corporation of Kanpur was not fulfilling its
responsibilities. The Court subsequently bifurcated the petition into two
parts.
The first dealt with the tanneries of Kanpur and the second with the
Municipal Corporation “Kanpur Nagar Mahapalika”.
. These are now called Mehta I and Mehta II in legislative digests, and
became the “Ganga Pollution Cases” – the most significant water pollution
litigation in the Indian court system.
By October 1987, the SC had invoked the Water Act and Environment
(Protection) Act, as well as Article 21 of the Indian Constitution (which
protects an individual’s right to life), to rule in Mr. Mehta’s favour. It ordered
the tanneries of Jajmau to clean their wastewater within six months and to
establish primary treatment plants if not Secondary treatment plants. That
is the minimum which the tanneries should do in the circumstances of the
case. The Court further held that the financial capacity of the tanneries
should be considered as irrelevant while requiring them to establish primary
treatment plants. Just like an industry which cannot pay minimum wages
to its workers cannot be allowed to exist a tannery which cannot set up a
primary treatment plant cannot be permitted to continue to be in existence
for the adverse effect on the public at large which is likely to ensue by the
discharging of the trade effluents from the tannery to the river Ganga would
be immense and it will outweigh any inconvenience that may be caused to
the management and the labour employed by it on account of its closure
This was followed by a January 1988 judgment that required Kanpur’s local
municipality to take several immediate measures to control water pollution:
relocation of 80,000 cattle housed in dairies or safe removal of animal waste
from these locations; cleaning of the city’s sewers; building of larger sewer
systems; construction of public latrines; and an immediate ban on the
disposal of corpses into the river. In addition to this, the Supreme Court
further relied on Article 52A (g) on the Constitution of India, which imposes
a fundamental duty of protecting and improving the natural environment.
The Court order that –
1) It is the duty of the Central Government to direct all the educational
institutions throughout India to teach at least for one hour in a week
lessons relating to the protection and the improvement of the natural
environment including forests, lakes, rivers and wildlife in the first ten
classes.
2) The Central Government shall get text books written for the said
purpose and distribute them to the educational institutions free of cost.
Children should be taught about the need for maintaining cleanliness
commencing with the cleanliness of the house both inside and outside, and
of the streets in which they live. Clean surroundings lead to healthy body
and healthy mind. Training of teachers who teach this subject by the
introduction of short term courses for such training shall also be
considered. This should be done throughout India.

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Ganga pollution cases: How Kanpur became the test case for environmental

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