The Punjab Environment Minister Om Prakash Soni today visited the Ghaggar River near Dera Bassi and directed the officers of the Environment Department and Pollution Control Board (PPCB) to keep a close tab on the industries in a bid to check the contamination of natural water resources. He said that the activities of spilling out industrial residue into the water resources would not be tolerated in any cost.He instructed the officers to constitute teams for regular checking of industries so that contaminated water should not be thrown into the rivers. He said that if any industry does not follow government instructions and continues to spill out contaminated water into river then strict action would be taken against erring unit.The cabinet minister asked the officers to ensure that the treatment plants in every industrial unit should be regularly run and reactivate old treatment plants so that the water could be well treated before putting into rivers. He said, “It’s a joint responsibility of environment department and pollution control boards officers to ensure that the industries under their jurisdiction not to spread any kind of pollution, if we found any dereliction in their duty, strict action would be taken against the concerned officer.”
Expressing grave concern over contaminated and untreated water being thrown by the industries of Chandigarh and Haryana into Ghaggar River, he said that the Punjab Government will soon write to stop untreated industrialist effluent. Regarding media reports on spreading pollution by local factories, Mr. Soni said that the matter has come into his notice, he on the spot directed concerned officer to take necessary action in this regard.The Cabinet Minister said that the Punjab government would not leave any stone unturned to make the environment of the state clean and the desired steps to be taken at war footing in this direction. He said that it is the moral responsibility of the industrialists also to not to throw contaminated water and other industrial residues in the rivers. He said that the all industries owes equal responsibility to check the contamination of water resources so they must ensure that industrial residue and untreated water is not being spilled out into the water resources.Simultaneously, he urged the people to make their contribution in preventing pollution. He said that he would soon visit all the rivers and streams of the state to check the ground realities of water contamination.Chief Environmental Engineer Mr. Gulshan Rai, Senior Environmental Engineer Mr. Sandeep Behal, Environmental Engineer Mr. Lavneet Kumar Dubey, Assistant Environmental Engineer Mr. Vijay Kumar and Mr. Gursharan Dass Garg were also present.