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Closure of soft drinks plants demanded

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI, AUG. 31. Demanding closure of all Coca-Cola and Pepsi bottling plants, social activists from Indian Social Action Forum today questioned the continuing supply of "these poisonous drinks'' all over the country. They have also called for a protest demonstration on Parliament Street here on Wednesday.

"After the Centre for Science and Environment report last year, the supply of these drinks has been stopped at the Parliament cafeteria. But the supply of these drinks continues all over the country. This is even when it has been found that the drinks contain pesticides beyond permissible limit. What is the present "sovereignty of our government? In 1977, they could throw Coca-Cola out of the country. But why haven't they done it this time?'' questioned a member of national executive committee, INSAF, Chitrananjan Singh, at a press conference here today.

Pointing out that bottling plants were responsible for heavy drawal of groundwater, social activist Nand Lal from Varanasi said, "We have been fighting against the bottling plant that is located in our village. The ground water levels have fallen drastically since the plant opened. It takes about 10 litres of water to make one litre of coke. By that calculation, about 20-25 lakh litres are used by the unit. Since they opened operations in our village, the ground water level has fallen from 25 feet to 40 feet''. He also listed out other forms of pollution like contaminated waste water that had been at first distributed among farmers. "But we protested and then they started discharging it into the Ganga. Now, after protests, they have started disposing it in large pits within their own campus. But we are worried that our groundwater may get contaminated because of this,'' he said.

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