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Sterlite complies with court order, halts operations

The Sterlite copper-smelter plant in Tuticorin has taken immediate steps to comply with Monday's order of the green bench of Madras high court directing that the plant's functioning be immediately halted, plant's senior vice president H Jallan said.

He denied as baseless allegations that accidents were occurring frequently in the unit due to the installation of second hand equipment. He said used equipment accounted for 1.1 per cent of the total capital investment of Rs 10 billion and none of the used equipment had been associated with accidents to date.

Although the plant had endeavoured to adopt the highest standards of safety by inducting two top-notch American experts to work full time in the 100,000 tonnes per annum plant, industrial accidents had taken place sometimes as in the case of any large industrial complex of this magnitude.

Last week, there was only a minor accident in the factory in which five employees sustained burns with acid; the acid tanker did not burst as erroneously reported in a section of the media, he claimed. One of the injured had already been discharged from hospital and others were recovering.

Although the incident had no relation to the high court's order, the clarification was issued in view of rumours circulating, he added.

He said the plant, which was set up after receiving due clearances from the Central and Tamil Nadu departments of forests and environment and the state Pollution Control Board, had not let a drop of liquid effluents from the factory during the last two years of operation and no case of any infringement of pollution control norms had come to light. It had operated peacefully with no adverse health impacts to any of its employees or the people living nearby, he claimed.

He said after the construction of the factory in mid-1996 a thorough audit of all pollution control measures was conducted by the board and the findings were vetted by scientific advisor Dr Shantappa on whose recommendations the board gave consent for the plant operation on October 1996.

Following representations from various members of the public against the plant functioning, the state government appointed an expert committee comprising Prof B Pitchumani of the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, Dr A A Khan of the Indian Institute of Technology, Hyderabad and Professor Joglekar of the National Chemicals Laboratory, Pune and it concluded that there would be no adverse impact due to the plant operation.

He recalled that the state government ordered the unit's closure when a neighbourhood unit complained of a gas leak leading to hospitalisation of its employees and appointed an experts committee headed by Dr Chockalingam of Anna University.

The committee concluded that the alleged incident could not have occured due to leakage of any gas from Sterlite Industries upon which the factory was reopened in August 1997.

Yet another committee appointed by the board to make a surprise check on the adequacy of all pollution control measures, had expressed satisfaction with regard to the measures adopted by the unit, he claimed.

UNI

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