E-Paper
NGT levies ₹2 crore penalty on PMC for violating order on garbage
PMC has not completely complied with tribunal order from 2018, related to a garbage dumping in Uruli Devachi, Phursungi
PUNE The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has directed the Pune municipal corporation (PMC) to pay ₹2 crore for not completely complying with the tribunal order from 2018, related to a garbage dumping ground in Uruli Devachi and Phursungi.
The order was passed by the principal bench of NGT comprising of chairperson Adarsh Kumar Goel; judicial members Justices Sudhir Agarwal, M Sathyanarayanan, and Brijesh Sethi; and expert member Nagin Nanda.
The amount will be used to enforce an action plan to restore the environment in the area which will have to be prepared by PMC, as originally directed, and submitted to the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB). The Maharashtra Environment Secretary will monitor the compliance by PMC. MPCB and state environment department will assess continued violation of Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016, and levy a compensatory amount that PMC will have to pay along with the ₹2 crore, according to the order.
In an order passed on July 19, 2018, the NGT had issued a showcause notice to PMC asking why an order from December 2017 had not been complied with. The 2017 order had directed PMC to come up with an action plan to clean up the garbage that had piled up in the dumping ground for the past several years. Additionally, the 2018 order, after the showcause notice, had directed PMC to submit an amount of ₹2 crore to the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB) in the form of a bank guarantee to ensure compliance. The 2018 order has mentioned that upon failure of compliance of any part of the order, the bank guarantee of ₹2 crore should be encashed.
Expert member Nagin Nanda was part of the bench which passed the 2017 and 2018 orders, and was part of the bench that passed the order of June 21, 2021 too.
An oversight committee was appointed with a validity of two years to ensure that the order is complied with.
However, the oversight committee has passed its validity and the waste still remains on the site. The money that PMC was supposed to furnish as guarantee in 2018 to MPCB has not been submitted.
Additionally, residents of the area who are the original applicants, claimed that not only has PMC and MPCB failed to clear the garbage, but they have also proposed a new garbage processing plant in the area. This claim, however, was denied by advocate Rahul Garg representing PMC.
“However, waste processing facility is proposed for 1550 MTD waste so that no waste is left to be landfilled. No fresh dumping of waste is taking place at the said site since January, 2020. A part of the site has already been bio-mined and the remaining site will also be soon cleared. However, learned counsel is not clear about the quantum of waste which remains to be cleared,” read a part of the order that described the PMC response.
There are three parties involved in the case - the residents, the PMC, and the MPCB.
When the court asked about how much waste still remains on the site, the PMC counsel had no answer and the MPCB counsel requested more time to come up with an answer.
