The Hindu 04.07.2013
Truck carrying waste from Kerala seized at Vellalore
A truck carrying nearly six tonnes of waste was seized near the Corporation compost yard at Vellalore near here on Wednesday.
The
waste was said to be transported from Kerala. A case has been
registered at the Podanur Police Station and the driver, Appusamy, a
resident of Salem, has been arrested.
The Tamil
Nadu-registered vehicle had gone from Salem carrying goods to Angamaly,
located around 40km from Kochi, where it was loaded with waste from the
canteen of the Nedumbaserry airport.
The truck had
come to Vellalore on Tuesday midnight, said K.S. Mohan, Secretary of
Kuruchi Vellalore Pollution Prevention Action Committee.
The
committee was formed by the residents 10 years ago to seek the
relocation of the compost yard at Vellalore, as fire and the resultant
smoke in the yard had been troubling them for long besides the menace of
flies swarming the area.
The security personnel of
the yard refused to allow the vehicle to enter the premises as it lacked
authorisation from the civic body officials certifying it to be part of
the fleet of vehicles involved in solid waste management project.
Sensing
trouble the truck driver fled the scene, Mr. Mohan said. Troubled over a
vehicle travelling more than 200km and crossing a State border to dump
waste, he said they alerted Corporation officials and police and had the
vehicle seized.
“While the top layers look like
canteen waste, we suspect there may be hazardous or biomedical waste in
the layers beneath. Only strong action would deter similar attempts in
the future,” he said.
A Corporation official said
that a police complaint was lodged following instructions from
Corporation Commissioner G. Latha, who has taken a strong view against
such attempts.
Meanwhile, Mayor S.M. Velusamy
exhorted the police to display “zero tolerance” towards Coimbatore being
treated as a backyard of Kerala for dumping waste and sought the police
to prosecute the driver besides seizure of the vehicle.
Water body
He also sought the active role of the police in preventing dumping of debris and waste along the water body.
Police
officials said that Sections 269 (negligent act like to spread
infection of disease dangerous to life), 294 (b) (obscene act in public
place) and 270 (malignant act likely to spread infection of disease
dangerous to life) besides 506 (i) (criminal intimidation) of IPC have
been invoked.