NGT Issues Notice on Panjab Floods; ED Attaches Malbros Properties

On 15 Dec, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) issued a notice to Bhakra Beas Management Board (BBMB) and the Panjab government over repeated floods in Panjab and issues related to dam operations, data transparency, and dam safety. After analyzing dam inflow and outflow data in 2023, a citizen’s initiative, the Public Action Committee (PAC) approached the Indian union and the Panjab governments to investigate the causes of floods in Panjab. After the PAC representations, from October 2023 to date, BBMB stopped placing critical dam operation data—relating to inflows, outflows, and reservoir levels—in the public domain. That is when, in keeping with the precautionary principle and the Dam Safety Act, PAC served a notice to BBMB, the union Water Resources Ministry, and the Panjab government urging immediate preventive action. PAC stated that with the NGT notice now the focus will shift to whether BBMB complied with statutory duties related to data disclosure, flood cushion maintenance, and precautionary dam operation. On another PAC submission, NGT has stayed further axing of trees under the modernization plan of the Minor Canal from Fatehpur Awana to Ayali Khurd until the next hearing in Ludhiana. Meanwhile, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has attached the immovable properties worth USD 8.7M of the Mansurwal village, Ferozepur-based Malbros distillery in a money laundering case under Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002 and filed a case against the company. ED investigations revealed that M/s Malbros International Private Limited ‘was involved in generation and acquisition of Proceeds of Crime by deliberately causing pollution of ground water by persistently and covertly injecting untreated effluents into deep aquifers through reverse boring, and repeatedly discharging wastewater onto land, drains, and an adjacent sugar mill. Its daily functioning involved persistent illegal discharge of untreated effluents into land and groundwater, causing large-scale irreparable ecological damage in the form of water pollution and consequent health hazards causing crop loss, cattle deaths, and serious health impacts for residents of villages around its premises.’ This is a significant signal to all other polluting industries in Panjab, including the dyeing and electroplating units which have been polluting the Buddha Nullah (rivulet) in Ludhiana (earlier coverage).