Aug.

Nearly five years after a Group of Ministers recommended a mandatory 10 per cent blending of ethanol in petrol as vehicle fuel, the implementation of the idea remains in the doldrums.

A cruel joke has been played out at the expense of the Bhopal victims of the world’s worst industrial disaster. The Supreme Court had ordered the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) to file a report on the status of the ground water contamination at the Union Carbide plant site in Bhopal by June 4, 2012.

The CPCB has treated this entire exercise in a rather lackadaisical fashion and from the six samples tested by them, five were taken from the drinking water supply of the Bhopal Municipal Corporation. The sixth sample was taken from a borewell dug in Street No. 8 and being used by the Ayasha Hotel at Arif Nagar in Bhopal.

Maheshbhai Patel is busy attending to customers in his small grocery shop in Gujarat Industrial Development Corporation estate in Vapi, Gujarat.

Days after the US mandated that the drinks containing a certain level of carcinogens will have to bear a cancer warning, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has asked its scientific panel to study the content of the beverages in India to see if the same warning is required here as well.
Recently, California added to its list of cancer causing chemicals a commonly used flavoured soda beverages, mandate containing a certain level of carcinogens bear a cancer warning label.

While the ingredients’ modifications were made by the beverage companies in the US caramel colouring using ammonia-sulfite in their sodas after the state of California added ammonia sulfite or 4-MI to its list of known carcinogens. The FSSAI has asked their experts to study the same. “This is a recent warning being put out.

A gang on Wednesday allegedly threatened and abused a group of activists and farmers campaigning against chemical industries causing pollution in the Cauvery, in hamlets around Gonur village at Mettur.

The activists have been campaigning since August 13 to urge the residents of Gonur, where the chemical factories are located, to attend the gram sabha meeting on Independence Day to take up the pollution issue.

The Supreme Court has washed its hands off monitoring the relief and rehabilitation schemes for the Bhopal gas victims, asking the Madhya Pradesh High Court early this week to keep an eye hencefort

Five non-government organisations representing victims of the 1984 Bhopal gas disaster on Monday described the latest decision taken at the meeting of Group of Ministers to send 350 tonnes of hazardous waste from the abandoned Union Carbide pesticide plant to Germany for safe disposal was a vindication of their long-standing demand on the issue.

They described this as a “minor but significant victory” in their 22 year long battle. At a press conference here, the organisations pointed out that the GoM’s decision has highlighted the toxic nature of Union Carbide’s waste and the ongoing dangers posed by the thousands of tonnes of hazardous waste in and around the abandoned pesticide factory.

It wants health booklets and smart cards issued to patients

To ensure proper implementation of the relief and rehabilitation programme and regular health care facilities for the Bhopal gas leak victims, the Supreme Court on Thursday ordered that all medical records of patients be computerised and health booklets and smart cards be issued to each victim. A Bench of Chief Justice S.H. Kapadia and Justices A.K. Patnaik and Swatanter Kumar gave this directive on a petition filed by the Bhopal Gas Peedith Mahila Udyog Sanghathan.

New Delhi: The Prime Minister’s Office has denied information on the Bhopal gas tragedy, Dow Chemicals and the London Olympic Games sponsorship issue under the RTI Act on the strange ground that a