ORDER

1. The proceedings have been initiated in the matter on the basis of the captioned media report to the effect that six persons have died and twelve injured in a fire incident in a pharma company at Akkireddygudem in West Godavari District in Andhra Pradesh. The fire incident is said to be due to reactor blast, on account of gas leak. The Chief Minister has announced compensation for the heirs of the deceased and also for the injured. OA

45/2022 (SZ) was also directed to be taken up with the suo motu matter in which order dated 20.4.2022 had already been passed seeking factual report.

2. As already mentioned, vide order dated 20.04.2022, the Tribunal sought report about the status of compliance of safety norms and steps required for prevention of such incidents in future. A joint Committee comprising of CPCB, State PCB and District Magistrate, West Godavari was constituted for the purpose. Operative part of the order is reproduced below:

(cid:147)2. Media report gives rise to a substantial question of environment about the compliance of safety norms in operation of the unit, particularly the Manufacture, Storage and Import of Hazardous Chemical Rules, 1989 and the Chemical Accidents (Emergency Planning, Preparedness and Response) Rules, 1996. It is necessary to ascertain whether on-site and off-site Plans have been prepared and mock drills conducted, as required. Though compensation for the victims has already been announced, the status of payment in pursuance of announcement also needs to be found. Further, it is necessary to examine what precautions should be taken to avoid recurrence of such incidents.

3. Accordingly, we constitute a joint Committee comprising of CPCB, State PCB and District Magistrate, West Godavari to ascertain the cause of incident, extent of damages caused, remedial measures taken for restoration, status of compliance of environmental safety norms, status of payment of compensation, steps required to be taken for restoration and to prevent any such incident in future. CPCB and State PCB will be the nodal agency for coordination and compliance. The joint Committee may take into account reports furnished in respect of similar incidents, in pursuance of orders of this Tribunal, in recent past, available on the website of CPCB, on the pattern of orders in O.A No. 272/2022 and O.A No. 143/2022.1 The Committee may undertake visit to the site, interact with the stakeholders and after verification of facts, furnish a report to this Tribunal within three months by e-mail at judicial-ngt@gov.in preferably in the form of searchable PDF/ OCR Support PDF and not in the form of Image PDF.(cid:148)(cid:148)

1Order dated 12.04.2022 in O.A No. 272/2022, In re: News item published in The Times of India

dated 12th April, 2022, titled (cid:147)Six killed in chemical factory blast in Gujarat(cid:148)

Order dated 08.03.2022 in O.A No. 143/2022, In re: News item published in The Tribune dated

22.02.2022 titled (cid:147)7 killed in blast at firecrackers factory in Himachal Una(cid:148)

3. In pursuance of above, report of joint Committee has been filed on 17.08.2022. It undertook visit to the site, interacted with officers of the management, ascertained the compliance status, cause of accident and compensation paid. Recommendations have also been made for further steps in the matter, including steps for preventing incidents in future.

Relevant extracts from the report are:

(cid:147)VI. a. Sequence of events and causes of accident The sequences of events are described as follows: