BHOPAL: The Madhya Pradesh government has informed the High Court that it has constituted a state-level committee of senior bureaucrats to conduct a detailed review of the contaminated water-related deaths in Indore, fix accountability and suggest preventive measures, a move that was strongly opposed by the petitioners, who termed it “nothing but eyewash”.
A state-level committee of senior bureaucrats has been constituted by the Dr Mohan Yadav government to conduct a detailed review of the contaminated water-caused deaths in the country’s cleanest city.
The committee will be headed by Additional Chief Secretary (General Administration Department) Sanjay Kumar Shukla and will include principal secretary (Public Health Engineering) P Narhari, Commissioner of Urban Administration and Development Directorate Sanket Bhondve and Indore divisional commissioner Sudam Khade, who will serve as its member secretary.
The panel will delve deeper into the actual reasons behind the tragedy, including administrative, technical and other factors. It will fix accountability of officials found responsible for the lapses and suggest measures to prevent any recurrence.
The committee will submit its report to the government within a month, the MP government informed the Madhya Pradesh High Court on Tuesday.
The committee will be empowered to obtain necessary records, reports and information from the concerned departments and will conduct site inspections if required.
“The committee will submit its investigation report to the state government as soon as possible, but within a maximum of one month,” an official public statement released by the MP government said.
Importantly, as directed by the Indore Bench of the High Court during the last hearing of the batch of petitions on the highly sensitive issue on January 15, the state’s chief secretary, Anurag Jain was present before the court through video conferencing during the hearing on Tuesday. He had appeared in a similar manner at the previous hearing as well.
The counsel for the petitioners, however, opposed the government’s move to constitute the committee, submitting that it would end up providing a protective shield to allegedly erring officials.
Senior advocate Ajay Bagaria, appearing for the petitioners, raised the issue of then Indore Municipal Commissioner Dilip Kumar Yadav, who was recently appointed managing director of the State Tourism Development Corporation a fortnight after being removed from Indore in connection with the deaths.
“During the course of hearing, the state placed on record an Interlocutory Application seeking constitution of a four-member committee purportedly to ensure effective implementation of the directions issued by the Hon’ble Court. At the outset, the proposed constitution of the committee was strongly opposed by the petitioners as well as the learned senior advocate appearing on their behalf," Bagaria told journalists later.
"It was submitted that all the members proposed in the so-called committee were holding senior bureaucratic and administrative positions, and that the petitioners have completely lost faith in the administrative machinery, whose prolonged inaction and failures have directly resulted in the present tragedy. It was argued that mere reconstitution of authority amongst the same administrative hierarchy would serve no meaningful purpose and would defeat the very object of judicial oversight,” Bagaria added.
Bagaria further drew the High Court’s attention to the compliance report filed by the state, which itself relies on reports of the Madhya Pradesh Pollution Control Board for the years 2016 to 2017.
These reports, he said, categorically record the presence of total coliform and faecal coliform contamination in every borewell sample collected across the town.
It was emphatically argued that despite such alarming findings having been officially documented nearly a decade ago, no effective remedial measures were undertaken, thereby exposing residents to prolonged and known health risks.
The senior advocate also referred to a Letter of Acceptance issued by the Indore Municipal Corporation in favour of M/s Malwa Engineering, pursuant to which work relating to the laying and construction of municipal drinking water pipelines was awarded in February 2023.
It was pointed out that as of January 14, 2026, barely 80 per cent of the work had been completed despite the lapse of nearly three years. It was further argued that, remarkably, within a span of barely one week, between January 14, 2026 and January 20, 2026, the remaining 20 per cent of the work under the said tender was stated to have been completed.
He submitted that it is deeply concerning that work which remained incomplete for years was suddenly finished in a matter of days only after judicial scrutiny intensified.
It was further argued that even assuming the work was subsequently completed, the occurrence of such a catastrophic contamination incident itself raises serious doubts about the quality, supervision and integrity of the execution.
Submitting that while the constitution of a committee may be warranted, Bagaria said such a body ought not to be dominated by serving bureaucrats or administrative officials.
It was suggested that, at best, only one administrative representative, namely the Collector, be included, and that the committee should otherwise comprise independent members, including but not limited to retired High Court judges such as Justice Shantanu Kemkar, in order to restore public confidence and ensure genuine accountability.
However, the High Court’s division bench in Indore did not pass any immediate observations on this proposal. After hearing all parties at length and considering the rival submissions, the court reserved its order.
Meanwhile, 24 residents of Bhagirathpura locality in Indore have died allegedly due to contaminated water supply since December 26, 2025, of whom 21 bereaved families have received compensation of Rs 2 lakh each from the district administration.
Currently, nine patients remain hospitalised, seven of them in intensive care units. According to the state government, Rs 1.21 crore has so far been spent on the hospital treatment of patients affected by the tragedy.