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Articles |
Indian leather hub targeted in
Ganges clean-up...
BY : YASMEEN MOHIUDDIN
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ARTICLE (March 06 2010): On the banks of the Ganges in northern India,
tanneries that have poured effluent into the holy river for decades are
closing. For environmentalists, it's a victory over filthy companies with no
regard for nature and a rare example of pollution legislation being
enforced.
They say the closures point to a willingness to tackle serial polluters even
at the expense of jobs. But the mostly Muslim workers and tannery owners in
the city of Kanpur, home to more than 400 of the estimated 2,100 tanneries
in the country, smell a religion-tinged vendetta against them and a
political conspiracy.
"Since we are Muslim, there is more pressure from the government for us to
control pollution," said Hafizur Rahman, president of the Small Tanners
Association in Kanpur. "There are many industries in Kanpur, and some of
them use harsher chemicals than ours. We have taken steps to treat effluent.
Why are we constantly being singled out?" The issue is linked to the
religious significance of the Ganges, Rahman added, referring to India's
majority-Hindu population who believe water from the river to be sacred.
Muslims have traditionally dominated India's leather sector because of their
willingness to work with cow carcasses - considered taboo by Hindus.
According to the Uttar Pradesh Leather Industries Association, 65 tanneries
have closed in the last two years, with 19 more ordered to shut.
The Allahabad High Court in 2008 ordered all industries accused of
discharging effluent directly into the Ganges - including tanneries - to
establish special treatment plants, move elsewhere, or risk being sealed.
Around Kanpur is one of the most heavily polluted stretches of the river,
where frothy brown wastewater can been seen pouring into the main channel
from storm drains or other pipes.
Rubbish forms into solid floating islands and a foul smell wafts over the
water's murky surface. Despite this, the belief that the Ganges washes away
sin entices millions of Hindus into the river each year. Rakesh Jaiswal, the
founder of a Kanpur-based environmental lobby group, called Eco Friends, has
little time for the protestations of the tannery owners.
"Everybody knows that tanneries are polluting the river," he told AFP. "One
can see tannery waste water that is a cocktail of chemicals going into the
river untreated through drains." The heavy metals and other pollutants kill
river life and get into the food chain through fish consumed by local people
and via crops that are irrigated with water from the river.
"It is a very easy excuse to say that they are being targeted because they
are the Muslim minority. That's not the reality," said Jaiswal, who wants
more stringent curbs on pollution from tanneries and other industries. Irfan
Ali, a Muslim worker, is caught in the middle of the struggle between
pollution fighters, local authorities and the tannery owners. He eats and
sleeps on the grounds of a leather factory that has been marked for closure.
Employees here spend long days using heavy machinery amid the stench of
chemicals and raw hide. Pay is low and protection from workplace dangers
even lower. "The tannery's electricity supply was cut a few days back and I
don't know when it will be running again," said Ali. "It doesn't matter why
we are being targeted. My wife and three children are dependent on me. If
the tannery is closed I will be forced to move back to my village."
The crackdown comes at a bad time for the industry in Kanpur as a whole.
Last year, India's Council for Leather Exports warned that the sector was
already in trouble due to the global economic downturn. It said Kanpur was
"near-idle" with tanneries operating at about 50 percent of normal levels.
The leather sector in Uttar Pradesh is worth almost 890 million dollars
annually and exports products all over the world, according to the state's
Leather Industries Association. A large-scale shutdown would spell disaster
for the city, which employs roughly 50,000 people directly and thousands
more indirectly in sectors such as shoe-making and textiles. Rahman called
the high court judgments "one-sided" and said compliance reports submitted
by the state Pollution Control Board had cleared tanneries of any
negligence. "This is a planned way to close the industry," he said.
Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2010
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