The Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB), in its effort to control pollution caused by pharmaceutical companies located in both specific industrial areas and outside, has issued another directive to pharmaceutical companies in the state directing them to take appropriate measures for pollution control. This is the second directive from the TNPCB and the first in the current year. Last year it had issued a directive to pharmaceutical companies in the state in this regard and warned of stringent actions against erring companies.

Sources in the TNPCB claimed that the directive has been reissued in the wake of its findings that the earlier directive had not been implemented in totality. "There is still a long way to go. Some of the companies have not taken measures to implement and the current directive is in the direction of prompting such companies to undertake pollution control activities," the source added.

The TNPCB sources claimed that the pollution levels at the SIDCO Industrial Estate in Cuddalore, which has plants of few big pharmaceutical companies continued to have high level of air pollution. Same is the case with the Alathur Pharmaceutical Complex near Chennai. "The companies may have been taking the required steps to control pollution but that is not enough," the source said. Most of the small scale pharmaceutical companies in the state have not invested enough to bring down pollution level.

The TNPCB has not made the study available to the pharmaceutical companies or to the concerned associations. Neither a deadline for the implementation of the pollution control norms has been indicated in the second directive nor specified its future course of action on erring companies.

The study is contrary to the claims made by the pharmaceutical companies in the state. Most of these small formulation manufacturers have stated that they were implementing the control measures. It can be recalled in this context that the Alathur Pharmaceutical Manufacturer's Association (APMA), in reply to the earlier directive from the TNPCB, had claimed that it was ready to implement the measures, provided help was forthcoming from the TNPCB.

The present directive has come at a time when there has been no recent report of hazards caused by pollution from pharmaceutical companies in the state.

No independent organization has conducted studies to gauge the pollution caused by pharmaceutical companies. Pharmaceutical companies in Chennai have time and again claimed that they were taking measures to implement the pollution control measures. Most of the pharmaceutical companies in the state are formulation manufacturers barring a few of the likes of Orchid Chemicals and Pharmaceuticals Limited and Shasun Drugs and Chemicals Limited which are into bulk drugs. While the SIDCO Industrial Estate in Cuddalore houses the facilities of Shasun and Tafac Industries, now closed, besides that of J K Pharmaceuticals. The Alathur Pharmaceutical Complex houses just one bulk drug facility, that is of Orchid.