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Mumbai: Civic apathy responsible for poisoning of air in Govandi, rising cases of TB

Mumbai: According to the civil society group Govandi New Sangam Welfare Society the Mumbai, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) biomedical waste incinerator in Govandi is directly responsible for a rising number of tuberculosis cases in the locality.

The health department data said that the M/E Ward alone has seen 1,877 TB-related deaths since 2013.

The report said that the area reports around 5,000 individual cases annually.

A survey undertaken by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai of the socioeconomic conditions of M (East) Ward in Mumbai in 2015 titled “Social Economic Conditions and Vulnerabilities”. The survey had in no unclear terms reported the following concerning overall health status of people residing in M (East) Ward”.


The TISS survey said that “Of major illnesses, more than 50 per cent respondents reported to have what are known as lifestyle illnesses such as heart disease, diabetes, respiratory ailments, blood pressure, followed by Tuberculosis (TB). Respondents from Shivaji Nagar, Mankhurd and Baiganwadi report the highest number of TB cases”.

An IA has been filed by the Govandi residents’ society in 2019, which was filed by the BMC’s concessionaire, SMS Envoclean, against a July 2019 closure notice issued to it by the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB), Hindustan Times reported.

In 2018, the MPCB had acted on the complaints and inspected the plant, finding rampant non-compliance with waste management rules, including failure to install dioxin and furans control systems, failure to segregate bio-medical waste properly and emitting double the permissible amount of particulate matter pollutants.

The application also cites three peer-reviewed studies -- ‘Biomedical Waste management in India: Critical Appraisal’, ‘Dioxins and Furans; And Hospital Waste Incineration’ and ‘Pollution and Tuberculosis: Outdoor sources’ -- which conclusively demonstrate the health risk posed by biomedical waste combustion. Some of the impacts include compromised immune systems, allergic respiratory disease, reduction in fertility, carcinogenesis, reduced thyroid function, thymic atrophy, wasting of body-mass and increased mortality.

“It is therefore submitted that there is a direct co-relation with consistent increase in number of medical cases concerning Tuberculosis, heart ailments and other respiratory diseases amongst persons who reside in close proximity to the incinerator of the Bio-Medical Waste Treatment Plant at Govandi and therefore, in the interest of lakhs of persons residing in M (East) Ward, it is absolutely necessary that the BMWT Plant at Govandi is permanently closed in an expeditious manner,” the group has pleaded, reiterating a long-standing demand.

The state environment department had clearly instructed the plant to be shifted to Khalapur by February 2022. This was then pushed to May 2022. Now, it was found out that because the plant has not yet received environmental clearance from the state expert appraisal committee, the people have to live amid the pollution for at least one more year. This constant delay does not inspire any faith in the local authorities,” said Shaikh Fayaz Alam, president of the Govandi New Sangam Welfare Society.

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