UNDERSTANDING ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION AND ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTIONISTS

Hai friends,

First of all, I would like you to give you a small story of a company in Kerala. But I am not dealing with that company or any other such business activities. I am dealing a with subject which is entirely different from it.

(Until the 1960s, Mavoor was like any other village in Kerala. During the 1960s the industrial house of Birla established a factory named 'Gwalior Rayons' (later renamed as Grasim) at Mavoor for producing pulp and fibre. An integrated township with schools, hospital, Police station also came up. The arrival of Gwalior Rayons caused a rapid change in area.
In 1985 Grasim shut down for 3 years. The disruption caused to the local economy was significant.[c(11 suicides in Mavoor have been attributed to this. In 1988, the Government of Kerala offered more concessions to the management and the factory was re-opened by the management.

A large quantity of pollutants produced by Grasim ended up in the river Chaliyar which flows beside the factory. Environmental organizations started agitations focusing on this aspect of the factory. A series of labour strikes and heightened trade union was also witnessed at the plant. All these factors contributed to the shut down of Gwalior Rayons in 2002. The closure of factory caused loss of employment around 3000 people.)

The Grasim story is only an example of environmental protection movement that caused a number of lives and thus the development of the country. There are a number of companies which closed because of the environmental pollution control. I am not against the environmental protectionism or protectionists. I am just telling what I feel about them.

Now days, we can see a large amount of area which are using as filling areas of waste. For example if we look near to our college Kalamassery, we can see it very well. We can’t stay or even walk there for 5 minutes. Whenever I see these type of waste dumping, I wonder where is the environmental protectionists, where is the Pollution control Board no one is there to bother about it.. even the public are not taking any initiative to remove it.. every one is being interested in it only when the diseases like chickun gunia, dunque fever etc come. India is going to be a developed country like England within 10 years, but still now we don't have a sophisticated technique for waste management.We are concern about the big things like global warming, green house gas effect etc but we are not concern about the basic things. I am not telling it is not important but we should consider all the facts. If the environmental protectionists take the half effort they are taking for closing the companies and causing the lives of number of people, they can easily do it. So I request them to do something for us…what they can do…only they can do it.

Thanking you,
Maya Justin.