Two accidents and its business as usual!

Kumar Organics had an accident where one of their reactors blew up on Jan 25th, 2010 around midday. TV9 carried a short report on the incident, but was soon pulled off air (one wonders why? and whether money was involved to make it happen??). I don't have first hand information, but the locals say some of the employees were critically injured and the resulting pollution was horrendous.

The company has dilapidated infrastructure, has had serious accidents and yet is functioning as usual. Why don't the authorities shut it down?

This is the second such incident. Kumar Organics had a fire accident in 2008, the following is the transcript from the Karnataka Pollution Control Board's report:

Proceedings of the 337TH TECHNICAL ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING
M/s.Kumar Organic Products Ltd., Unit-2, Sy. Nos 49 & 8/1, Harappanahalli, Jigani Hobli, Anekal Taluk, Bangalore Urban Dist. manufactures Zinc Pyrithione (ZPT) of 200 MT/annum with consent, and Rose Oxide of 60 T/annum without consent of the Board.

A fire accident occurred in the industry on 27.03.08 and 28-03-08. After the accident the Board has withdrawn the consent issued to the industry and issued closure order under Water Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1974 on 29-03-08.

........................(report continues)

Here is the full report. You can get it whenever the kspcb website is working! http://kspcb.org/TAC_337.pdf

Smell from Hell - Hikal, Karntaka ChemSyn & Kumar Organics

There is persistent pollution in the layouts in and around Jigani (Nisarga, Nandanavana, Pride Vatika, Vakil Townscape, Vakil Hamlet, etc) that gives off a foul smell and causes throat & eye irritation and allergic fever. Several security guards in the layout have had ill effects like vomiting from the noxious fumes. The local village folks claim that over several years, the chemical may be causing heart and kidney problems as well.

We traced the source toHikal (even the trees around this factory are dead) and Karnataka ChemSyn. They have a plant in Jigani phase II, on the link road.

Here is the map

If you are client or a potential client of these companies, please do the world a favor and buy from some other company that respects the pollution norms of their country.

Illegal Quarrying (near Nisarga, Nandanavana)

Residents here know that there is illegal quarrying in the area. Repeated complaints have not yielded any results. One line of thinking is that the Department of Mines & Geology which is supposed to regulate and oversee the operations actually informs them when a complaint is made and the work is stopped for a few days. Then it is business as usual.

There is a government order prohibiting quarrying in that area, but hey, this is India. We have political clout, money power and we will do as we please! The public be damned!

A picture is equivalent to a 1000 words!

Of course, all this blasting has wrecked havoc on nearby buildings, creating cracks and structural damages.

If you are considering buying a site or building a house in Nisarga or Nandanavana or any of the glitzy layouts in and around Jigani - do your due diligence before you put in your hard earned money.

A house is not called an "immovable asset" without reason!

Killers on the loose! Air pollution at Nisarga, Nandanavana, Pride Vatika & Vakil Townscape

There is a saying in Jigani, "we like to see the air we breathe!"

Jigani was a sleepy village south of Bangalore till a few years back. The real estate boom has created a number of residential layouts near this village. The famous are:
Nisarga Layout
Nandanavana
Pride Vatika
Vakil Townscape

Behind all the glitz and marketing for a Bangalore of yore (and what you won't hear from their marketing departments) is that the area is beset by illegal quarrying and noxious fumes from chemical factories in Jigani industrial area.

Updated: The early morning haze from the industrial belt:


The worst polluter from this area is HiKal (http://www.hikal.com/), Karnataka ChemSyn (aka Avigna Pharma) and Kumar Organics (http://www.kumarorganics.net) (aka KOP Research and Syntheon). Now, if you are a client of theirs, please do the world a favor and purchase from some other company that respects local pollution norms.

I'll blog about them in detail, with photos