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Separate bench of Andhra HC to hear LG polymers gas leak case
The Andhra Pradesh high court had suo motu taken up the case of styrene gas leak from LG Polymers plant at R R Venkatapuram in Visakhapatnam on the day the incident took place last month.
A separate bench of the Andhra Pradesh high court will hear the case of LG Polymers India Ltd from whose plant at Visakhapatnam a leakage of styrene gas on May 7 killed 12 people.
A vacation bench of the high court comprising Justice A V Sesha Sai and Justice K Lalitha on Thursday directed the registrar to refer the LG Polymers issue to chief justice J K Maheshwari to constitute a separate bench to conduct the hearings.
The vacation bench, which took up the petition of LG Polymers to allow 30 of its employees into the Visakhapatnam plant to take up emergency works, posted the case to a later date which the chief justice will decide after the court vacations end on June 15.
The high court had suo motu taken up the case of styrene gas leak from LG Polymers plant at R R Venkatapuram in Visakhapatnam on the day the incident took place.
Meanwhile, the Andhra Pradesh government filed a counter-affidavit to the high court stating that it had not given any no-objection certificate (NOC) to LG Polymers Ltd to reopen the Visakhapatnam plant as part of relaxations granted to industries during Lockdown 3.0 after May 4.
In the counter-affidavit, state special chief secretary (industries) Karikal Valavan said the LG Polymers had indeed sent a mail to the industries department seeking permission for operation of the plant and the government had asked the company to submit a declaration stating that its plant did not come under the containment zone and the buffer zone.
“However, there was no such declaration from LG Polymers. So, the department has not given any NOC to the company. Moreover, polystyrene, expandable polystyrene and engineering plastics do not fall under the essential industrial goods category,” the official said in the affidavit.
The official clarified that there was no contamination of drinking water in Meghadrigadda reservoir closer to the LG Polymers plant. The Andhra Pradesh Pollution Control Board (APPCB) authorities had tested the water samples and had not found any residues of styrene in the water. It was also studying the air pollution levels around the company from time to time, he said.
Valavan said the APPCB had already withdrawn the consent given to the company for production and management of the Vizag plant. The company had been sealed and the passports of the directors had been seized, he explained.
