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M. P. Pollution Control Board without a head

Staff Correspondent

The last full-time Chairman was asked by the Minister to quit office on July 7

BHOPAL: The Madhya Pradesh Pollution Control Board, which is a statutory organisation constituted in 1974 to implement the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, is without a full-time Chairman.

The last full-time Chairman of the Board, P.S. Dubey, was asked by the State Minister for Environment and Housing, Jayant Malaiya,to quit office on July 7 and he had responded by immediately tendering his resignation. Professor Dubey told The Hindu on Tuesday evening that he was yet to receive a formal communication from the State Government regarding the status of his resignation.

Resignation accepted

On being contacted, Mr. Malaiya said that Professor Dubey's resignation had been accepted and the Government had asked the Principal Secretary of his department, P.D. Meena, to "take charge till further orders". Besides the Water Act of 1974, the Board also looks after the Water Cess Act, 1977, the Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1981, the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, the Hazardous Waste (Management and Handling) Rules, 1989, the Manufacture, Storage and Import of Hazardous Chemicals Rules, 1989, the Environment Impact Assessment Notification, 1994, the Biomedical Waste (Management and Handling) Rules, 1998, the Recycled Plastic Manufacture and Usage Rules, 1999, the Municipal Solid Waste (Management and Handling) Rules, 2000, the Noise Pollution (Regulation and Control) Rules, 2000 and the Battery (Management and Handling) Rules 2000.

The Board has been vested with considerable authority and is the enforcement agency to control and prevent pollution caused by industrial effluents under the Water Act of 1974 and Air Act of 1981. It is also supposed to advise the State Government on matters relating to pollution, collect and disseminate information, carry out inspection, lay down effluent and emission standards and issue consent to industries and initiate activities for compliance of prescribed emission and effluent standards.

Answerable to Centre

The Board is also answerable to the Central Government as the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) provides financial assistance to State pollution Control Boards on specific projects relating to prevention and control of pollution like hazardous waste management and management of municipal solid waste as well as upgradation of laboratories.

An evaluation study on the functioning of the State Pollution Control Boards conducted at the initiative of the Planning Commission had earlier highlighted the predominance of non-technical members in most of the Boards and the lack of professionals in the composition of Boards.

Board bureaucratised

The study had further pointed out: "The Water (Prevention and control of pollution) Act 1974 lays down the constitution of the State Pollution Control Boards. It has been noted that the representative character of the Board members is not wide and for all practical purposes the Board is bureaucratised".

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M. P. Pollution Control Board without a head

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