KOCHI: The Kerala High Court on Monday directed the Director General of Police (DGP) to provide police protection to take the machinery purchased by the Thiruvananthapuram Corporation for the leachate plant at Vilappilasala to the plant site. A Division Bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Manjula Chellur and Justice V Chidambaresh passed the order while considering a petition filed by the Thiruvananthapuram Corporation seeking the Court’s intervention in the Vilappilsala issue.
Corporation’s counsel Advocate N Nandakumara Menon submitted that valuable machinery has been brought from Pune for constructing the leachate plant. ‘’A representation was given by the Corporation to the DGP to provide adequate police protection to take the machinery to the site. But there was no response from the police and ultimately the machinery had to be unloaded on the premises of the Corporation office,’’ he said.
The petitioner submitted that it had treated 4,800 metric tonnes of solid waste accumulated in the plant. “Non-degradable solid waste that was outside the plant could be disposed of under the Treatment Plant Rules-2002 only by sanitary landfilling. For this purpose, 300 loads of clay is needed. Due to the protest, it was not possible carry out this work. The construction of the leachate plant in the site is also halfway through,” the Corporation’s counsel said.
However, the Panchayat and the Janakeeya Samara Samithi submitted that this method may cause pollution of underground water and that it would affect the health of the residents.
The petitioner pointed out that a sub-committee had been constituted by the mediation centre and that it would file the final report regarding the solutions that could be adopted for disposal of the entire waste.