The Hindu 01.12.2010
Corpn. has to submit fresh proposal
K.V. Prasad
| To complete sewage treatment plant at Nanjundapuram |
Wasted effort?A view of the sewage treatment plant on Nanjundapuram Road in the city. –
COIMBATORE: The Coimbatore Corporation will have to submit a fresh proposal to the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board in order to complete the sewage treatment plant at Nanjundapuram. The implication is that the Corporation has to dismantle whatever it has put up so far at the site.
The call for the fresh proposal follows a hearing conducted by the board in Chennai. The hearing was ordered by the High Court while disposing of a petition from the residents near the site, seeking restraint on the Corporation from putting up the plant. The residents said the plant would be too close to their house and therefore pose health hazards. They wanted it shifted to some other site.
Changes
After hearing both sides, the board said the Corporation should revise the proposal for the plant, incorporating the changes suggested by a committee of experts that studied the construction of the plant so far, the issues raised by residents and matters relating to pollution control norms.
Everything now depends on what kind of a response the Corporation comes up with, in regard to changing the plan with which it has gone about putting up the plant, official sources in the pollution control board say. The sources say the Corporation had not got its consent for establishing the plant.
The board will study the fresh proposal. If it is convinced that the norms are being met, the board will clear the project. At present, the plant structure is close to human habitations. The residents claim that it is around 15 ft from their houses. The board officials say the Corporation has to leave a buffer zone between the houses and the plant.
The sources also indicate that if the Corporation has to rework the project, including the layout plan, 60 per cent to 70 per cent of the structure already put up will have to be dismantled.
This, in turn, means that a large amount of funds spent so far is as good as having done down the drain.
Apart from the plant at Nanjundapuram, the Corporation is establishing one at Ukkadam. Both the plants are vital components of the civic body's Rs.377-crore underground drainage scheme under implementation.
The scheme's completion and proper drainage disposal hinges on the completion of the Nanjundapuram project.
Coimbatore Corporation Commissioner Anshul Mishra says the sewage treatment plant project is not under any threat and that it will be implemented.
The Corporation is working on the fresh suggestions made by the pollution control board to meet the norms.
The residents wonder how two different rules can be applied to similar types of projects. When the Corporation has gone by the rule that the treatment plant should be more than 800 ft from human habitation at Ukkadam, why was it not applied to Nanjudapuram project, they ask. The residents want the plant project shifted to Vellalore, where the Corporation has a sewage farm.
