The Hindu

• Corporation to set up three sewage treatment plants for the purpose 
• Concern expressed over laxity in controlling aquatic pollution
• Need to adopt ecological sanitation stressed

Mangalore, Jul 1: The Mangalore Special Economic Zone (MSEZ) will meet its requirement of water by using the sewage treated at three treatment plants which will soon be put up by Mangalore City Corporation.

This was revealed by I.S.N. Prasad, managing director and executive officer of MSEZ Ltd, at the inaugural function of a workshop on aquatic pollution and its control held at the College of Fisheries here on Monday. It was organised by the College of Fisheries, Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB) and New Mangalore Port Trust (NMPT).

Mr. Prasad said the MSEZL might use about 18 million gallons of treated water a day. The corporation had proposed to put up the three sewage treatment plants and MSEZL would “pick up” the entire quantity of the treated water. “We will further treat that water before using it. This will meet nearly 70 per cent of our water requirements,” he said and added that if made available, the company would utilise more quantity.

Latest equipment

Chairman of KSPCB H.C. Sharatchandra urged the district administration to install latest treatment plants. Terming the efforts of the pollution control board in monitoring and controlling the aquatic pollution as “not enough”, he said the colleges in different regions would be involved in this endeavour. As many as 100 kits would be provided to as many colleges for the purpose, he added. Mr. Sharatchandra said that the treatment of sewage was a big challenge. In Bangalore, only 40 per cent of the sewage was being collected under the sewage collection network and only 40 per cent of that was being treated. Rest of the sewage was getting into the natural water bodies. As a result, the three valleys of the capital city had been contaminated. The situation was not different in Mangalore he added, without elaborating.

He said it was high time the country adopted ecological sanitation or dry lavatories to avoid or minimise the production of sewage water. About 2,200 households in Tiruchirapally had successfully tried them, he said.

About 15 years ago, potable water was available everywhere. Now, even rural people had started using packaged drinking water indicating the level of water pollution, he said.

Chairman of expert advisory committee on infrastructure, Ministry of Environment and Forests, Nirmal A. Andrews, said more than 20,000 million litres of sewage was getting into freshwater sources in the country. The Ministry had plans to overcome this problem by 2012. As development activities such as building ports, jetties and industries could not be avoided, it was imperative that people joined hands with government agencies in solving environmental issues, he said.

Deputy Commissioner M. Maheshwar Rao said the administration was taking up the task of containing environment pollution with large industries and those engaged in fish processing.