Sepa has never used its lab equipment: judicial commission

Says in its report there’s nothing to back environmental watchdog’s achievement claims; observes Sepa is confined to office files, writing letters and issuing notices

The Sindh Environmental Protection Agency (Sepa) has never used the chemical, analytical and microbiological laboratories at its head office for the last many years and all the expensive equipment there seems “untouched and unused”, a judicial commission has noted in its report submitted to the apex court on Monday.

“It appears that Sepa’s initiatives are mainly confined to office files, writing letters and issuing notices. It is obvious that Sepa, at least in the present situation and in the present set-up, is unable to deliver and perform, in spite of having ample powers under the 2014 Act,” the commission wrote in its 130-page report.

The commission, headed by Justice Muhammad Iqbal Kalhoro, was formed by the Supreme Court to probe looking into the issues of potable water and sanitation conditions in Sindh and the statutory role played by the environmental watchdog on the issues mandated by the Sindh Environmental Protection Act, 2014.

The judicial commission revealed in its report that Sepa did not employ any scientific methodology to monitor ecological degradation caused by direct inflow of untreated effluent in sea and no exact data of all the industries functioning in Sindh was available with it.

The state-of-the-art air monitoring system to evaluate air pollution installed on the roof of Sepa’s office appears to have never been put into use, the judicial commission found during its visit there.

Sepa started its latest drive against industries generating toxic effluent and discharging it into water bodies only after the judicial commission asked about the data about it. During the proceedings of the commission, Sepa officials produced “incomplete figures”.

“The factories are directly discharging untreated effluent in water bodies, but Sepa did not appear to be concerned about it, and it did not seem to have an idea as to how and to what extent the untreated effluent is destroying the flora, fauna and biodiversity of coastal waters,” the judicial body noted in the report.

Besides, Sepa is unaware of how factories are generating toxic effluent.

 “Sepa was reminded that the majority of the industrial units have not installed wastewater treatment plant in compliance with 2014 Act, but it has not acted beyond issuing some notices and in some cases referring the matter to the tribunal constituted under 2014 Act.”

The commission said the environmental watchdog’s claim that because of its efforts 75 industrial units in Karachi division and 34 in rest of the divisions of the province had installed wastewater treatment plants could not be established authentically.

Sepa technical director Waqar Hussain Phulpoto also conceded before the judicial commission that Sepa officials did not randomly check and test the effluent of the units where treatment plans had allegedly been installed, and if ever any inspection of the unit was carried out, its information was conveyed to the management of the unit in advance almost a week earlier.

“There is no credible record of any visits paid by Sepa officials to factories to monitor and check if the environmental provisions were being complied with or not.

During the inquiry, Sepa officials maintained that because of their actions many changes had occurred including installation of wastewater treatment plants in factories, legal action against factories which did not install pre-treatment plants, stoppage of burning of old batteries in Hyderabad and Karachi, prevention of dumping and burning of solid waste in Karachi, management of hospital waste, monitoring of cement industries in Sindh, stone crushing units, prohibition on non-degradable plastic products and compliance with environmental laws in sugar mills.

But the commission said it had neither seen the effects of these actions, nor was Sepa able to produce any authentic record showing tangible results achieved so far.

The factories are still discharging waste water without treatment, hospital waste is in disarray and is mostly being burnt inside hospital premises, and sugar mills do not seem to be bothered about complying with environmental laws and are discharging waste without treatment in water bodies.

The coast is constantly experiencing degradation due to constant inflow of untreated effluent and spill-over of oil from ships, yet Sepa is making claims of a good performance, the judicial commission report revealed.

Despite having ample powers under 2014 Act, which gives extraordinary powers to Sepa, the authority is not functioning as per its mandate and taking cosmetic measures to improve environmental conditions in the province, the judicial commission report concluded.