There is growing concern that India’s environmental degradation — poisoning — may have a ‘foreign hand’ as well. Stricter regulatory standards in Europe, complemented by rising public outrage and falling competitiveness, is bringing about the transfer of decommissioned dirty industrial plants to Indian shores, as was pointed out by Ameer Shahul, an author and an environmentalist, in a recent article. There is substantial evidence to support this conjecture. Some years ago, Italy shut down a polluting plant that had poisoned both groundwater and thousands of people in Vicenza. What had led to death and devastation in Italy was — shockingly — thought of as a lucrative business opportunity by an Indian company that proceeded to acquire the proverbial poison gravy train and locate it in an industrial estate abutting a wildlife sanctuary in Koyna. Two polymer trains — accused of producing polycarbonates linked to toxic emissions — are being dismantled by Dow Chemical in Germany; only for the proceeds to be reassembled in Dahej in Gujarat. These are, of course, not the only instances of what ecologists describe as ‘pollution colonialism’ where the industrial West dumps its toxic wares on a profiteering-minded developing world. It must also be pointed out that the records of Indian industries on this front are equally bleak. Vedanta’s depredations in Odisha are well-documented. Even public sector undertakings, especially oil companies, have been penalised by the Central Pollution Control Board for violating environmental regulations.
The real issue is that there exists a State-mandated permissive culture that encourages such transgressions in this country. The consequences of such complicity include a weak regulatory mechanism to identify and then penalise such violations. Enforcement of regulatory standards is feeble. The abundance of cheap land and labour also makes commercial procurement of used reactors, distillation apparatus and other detritus profitable. The lack of transparency, as experts have pointed out, enables the vested interests — bureaucrats and investors — to pass this trade in poison as an instance of economic growth. The price of the pursuit of the fruits of poison is evident: contaminated water and food, falling soil productivity, the rise of cancer hubs near polluting industries and so on. The recent discovery of traces of uranium in the breast milk of lactating mothers in several of Bihar’s districts reveals the depth of the horror whose root lies in the willingness to sacrifice environmental protection and public health at the altar of commerce.