Pissurlem farmer threatens suicide if pollution to his field doesn’t end

VALPOI: Manohar Parab, a 42-year-old Pissurlem farmer, is threatening to commit suicide in front of the Goa State Pollution Control Board along with his family, if his problems are not solved.

Parab, who is growing agricultural crops from his childhood, in his own field, is fighting for the past 10 years with polluting industries, Ambey Metallic and a steel company, which are situated in the Pissurlem IDC area. His fight is to stop these two polluting industries, which are causing dust and air pollution, right from beginning and have destroyed almost all agriculture fields from his village.

According to Manohar Parab, these two industries are creating air and dust pollution and throwing their chemical waste in a rivulet (Nalla), which lies close to Parab’s agricultural property. Parab uses the water from the rivulet to carry out his agricultural works.

These industries are dumping chemical waste in the village nalla for the past one decade. No government authority is reportedly ready to take action against the industries. Manohar Parab, who has 10,000 sq mts of his agriculture land, grows rice in the monsoon and cultivates vegetables and has cashew plantation during summer. In the year 2008 all the waste from Ambey Metallic industry was spread all over his agriculture field.

Because of this waste, his agriculture soil gets contaminated affecting his crops. Every year Parab faces a loss of Rs one or two lakh. The farmer claims that his hard work goes in vain because this chemical waste destroys most of his crop for the past ten years.

Six years back, he had filed a complaint regarding these two polluting industries with the Mamlatdar office, Valpoi. With no response from the Mamlatdar, Parab then filed a complaint with the North Goa Deputy collector, who only gives him dates of his visit but nothing materialises. Fed up with this, Parab wrote to the North Goa Collector, who also failed to respond. Now Parab has approached the high court hoping his problems will end. The local panchayat washes its hands off saying that the IDC is not coming in its jurisdiction.

Two days back, a village buffalo died after drinking the chemical water. The body is still lying in the nalla with no one willing to remove it. The stench is slowly polluting the air.

“The Goa State Pollution Control Board team visits the site and files reports after taking samples but no action is forthcoming against these two industries till date,” says Parab.

Fed up with no response from the authorities, Parab has now threatened to end his life in front of the GSPCB office along with his family.