Science & TechEnvironment
Green tribunal summons Delhi pollution panel's top official over lab equipment
The DPCC told the NGT it did not have the equipment to test groundwater around the Ghazipur landfill as ordered, and that it had floated a tender to buy it.
Key points
- The NGT told the DPCC member secretary to appear and explain the state of the committee's laboratory.
- The DPCC said it lacked groundwater testing equipment and had floated a tender on the GeM portal.
- The tribunal had ordered samples from at least 20 locations around the Ghazipur landfill.
The National Green Tribunal on Friday told the member secretary of the Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC) to appear before it and explain whether the city’s pollution watchdog has a working laboratory, after the committee admitted it did not have the equipment to test groundwater near the Ghazipur landfill.
A bench of NGT chairperson Justice Prakash Shrivastava and expert member Dr Afroz Ahmad was hearing a case it took up on the basis of a news report about a fire at the landfill in east Delhi.
In an earlier order, the tribunal had asked the DPCC to collect groundwater samples from at least 20 places within the prescribed radius of the landfill, later widened to 1.5 km, and test them under the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2026. It wanted a report on the results.
On Friday, the DPCC’s counsel told the bench that the committee did not have the equipment needed for groundwater testing. A tender had been floated on the Government e-Marketplace (GeM) portal, the counsel said, and testing would begin once the equipment arrived.
The bench said the DPCC was expected to have a fully equipped laboratory. It directed the committee’s member secretary to appear virtually at the next hearing and set out the state of the lab and the equipment it has.
The DPCC had not been represented at the previous hearing, and the tribunal had sent its order to the member secretary for compliance. Counsel for the Municipal Corporation of Delhi said he had been engaged only the day before and asked for time to gather documents.