Residents of Chhatar village in Tankara taluka of Morbi district got here out of their houses on Monday night time at round 11 pm after a toxic scent emanated from the world, fearing that there is likely to be a gasoline leak. Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB) officers reached the village and confirmed that the smoke was from poisonous industrial waste dumped illegally by somebody on the banks of GIDC within the village and it was managed by bleaching.
The GPCB officers additionally knowledgeable the police who reached the spot. “We sensed the smell of pesticide and found traces of waste left on the side of GIDC in Chhattar, on the side of the highway. We suspect that someone may have tried to dump industrial waste illegally but fled after the villagers came out of the village,” Krishnakumar Vaghela, regional officer (RO) of GPCB in Morbi advised The Indian Express .
Vaghela stated that the quantity of rubbish dumped in Chhatar village shouldn’t be a lot. “We suspect that it is emanating from a pesticide plant or a pharmaceutical unit. We have collected the samples and sent it to our laboratory in Gandhinagar for analysis and fingerprinting,” Vaghela stated.
The RO of GPCB stated that his group managed the foul scent by sprinkling lime over the waste. “Villagers feared that there might be a gas leak from the gas pipeline passing through the village. But we assured them that this is not the case… After overcoming the smell, with the help of the police, we persuaded the villagers to return to their homes,” Vaghela stated. On the appliance of GPCB, a non-cognizable offense has been registered in opposition to the unknown individual on the Tankara police station. “We have requested the Morbi superintendent of police to examine the footage of CCTV cameras installed on the highway and roads leading to Chhatar village,” the RO stated.
There are not any registered chemical processing factories in Morbi that generate such hazardous waste, Vaghela stated, including, “We suspect that the culprits may be from any unauthorized factory in Morbi or any pharma or pesticide factory in Rajkot.”
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With inputs from TheIndianEXPRESS
