Tuesday, March 19, 2019<\/p>\n
By Rajiv Shah
\nIn a major embarrassment for Gujarat model, of the 21 samples taken by officials of the state government’s environmental watchdog Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB) in two villages of Vadodara district and analyzed by its laboratory in Gandhinagar, the state capital, to find out pollution level in groundwater, 16 were assessed as highly contaminated \u2013 these were, in fact, found to be discharging reddish, brownish, reddish, or yellowish water.
\nThe samples, says a GPCB report, were taken in October and December 2018 following a complaint the official watchdog body\u2019s Vadodara office received from the top environmental voluntary organization, Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti (PSS), and Farmers\u2019 Action Group (FAG), representing farmers of the region.
\nFollowing the complaint, says the report, officials of GPCB regional office and vigilance office, Vadodara, swung into action with Rohit Prajapati of PSS and Ghanshyambhai Patel and Kirit Amin of FAG, visiting villages in Padra taluka to examine \u201c21 borewells\/abstraction wells\u201d after taking their \u201cwater samples\u201d.<\/p>\n
Borewell samples within the premises on an industrial unit
\nThe GPCB officials who participated in the sample-taking exercise \u2013 RP Rana, MV Soni, and MU Patel, all of them environmental engineers \u2013 found that, in nine borewells, whose samples were collected from within the premises of an industrial unit in Umaraya village of Padra taluka, the colour of the water was \u201creddish tinge, reddish, reddish brown or brownish.\u201d
\nIn the 12 other borewell water samples, collected from villages Luna and Umayara in the areas surrounding several other industrial units, the engineers found several variations, ranging from \u201cdark yellow\u201d and \u201creddish\u201d to \u201cyellowish\u201d. Only five of the 21 samples, including three meant for drinking water, one for panchayat, and one for an industrial unit, were discharging \u201ccolourless\u201d water.
\nThe report says, in the borewell of the farm of Geetaben Patel in village Luna, the water, being used for irrigation for the last six years, was \u201cshining yellow\u201d; in the borewell of Kapilaben Ramanbhai Patel\u2019s farm also in Luna village, the colour of the water \u2013 being used by cattle for drinking and irrigation \u2013 was \u201creddish\u201d to \u201cdark yellow\u201d, though earlier it was \u201clight red\u201d.<\/p>\n
Other borewells in farmlands, an industrial unit discharging polluted water
\nFurther, in the borewell of the farm of Ghanshyambhai Ramanbhai Patel, again in Luna village, meant for agriculture and cattle drinking, the colour was found to be \u201cyellowish\u201d. The borewell of the farm of Gansyambhai Chandubhai Patel, also of Luna village, discharged \u201clight yellow water\u201d, and was being used for agriculture for the last seven years. Then, the borewell of the farm of Rameshbhai Somabhai Padhiyar of Umraya village was also discharging reddish water or pale yellow water for irrigation for the \u201clast 13 years.\u201d
\nThe situation was found to be the same in the water coming out of the borewell of the premises of an enterprise in village Luna, where the water had \u201creddish tinge\u201d, and the borewell of the farm of Bhadreshbhai Bachubhai Sindha of Umraya village, which discharged reddish water, meant for \u201cagriculture and cattle drinking\u201d.<\/p>\n
The report, obtained by PSS on March 11, 2019 following a Right to Information (RTI) plea, suggests that the water in the borewells in Padra villages had \u201cdangerously very high” COD (chemical oxygen demand), said Prajapati, adding, the evidences suggest that groundwater pollution had crossed \u201ceven the limit of industrial effluent discharge norms.\u201d
\nCalculates the environmentalist, COD was found to be 2,225 mg\/l on October 16, 018) and 2,722 mg\/l on December 26, 2018) in village Luna; TDS (total dissolved solids) was found to be 10,172 mg\/l on October 16, 2018, and 11,188 mg\/l on December 26, 2018); and BOD (biological oxygen demand) was 198 mg\/l on October 16, 2018 and 72 mg\/l December 26, 2018.
\nIn his strongly-worded letter to Government of India and Gujarat government officials, warning that if they do not act, it would be construed as \u201ccontempt of court of the Supreme Court order, dated February 22, 2017\u201d, in PSS activists\u2019 Writ Petition (Civil) 375 of 2012, and \u201cmay result in suitable further action\u201d, Prajapati says, \u201cCOD of groundwater has crossed the acceptable or permitted limits of the industrial effluent discharge, which is 250 mg\/l COD\u201d — a \u201cdisastrous situation\u201d.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Tuesday, March 19, 2019 By Rajiv Shah In a major embarrassment for Gujarat model, of the 21 samples taken by officials of the state government’s environmental watchdog Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB) in two villages of Vadodara district and analyzed by its laboratory in Gandhinagar, the state capital, to find out pollution level in groundwater, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[3,54],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paUKPQ-2H3","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10357"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10357"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10357\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10358,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10357\/revisions\/10358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}