Blanket ban on plastic in Delhi not possible

The panel consisting of Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) and Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC) officials which recently submitted its report to the Delhi High Court has also put a question mark on Delhi Government's decision to promote bio-degradable plastic bags.     

"Degradable plastics do not decompose naturally on account of action of microorganism. Mere disintegration of molecular structure cannot be taken as degradation," the Committee said in response to a petition filed by an NGO Tapas on the plastic menace in the national capital.     

Environment activist V K Jain of Tapas had sought total ban on plastic bags pointing out that they were choking drains and leading to collection of dirty water and consequently creating breeding grounds for several diseases.     

He also cited examples of Germany, Singapore besides countries like Bangladesh where ban on plastic bags have been successfully implemented.      

The committee, however opined, "plastic is used worldwide for packaging of medicines, life-saving drugs and a wide range of personnel care products. It can therefore be concluded that a blanket ban on use of plastic is not called for."

The Committee led by CPCB Chairman J M Mauskar, DPCC Chairman J K Dadoo and former Delhi High court judge R C Chopra, however, agreed with Jain's observations regarding degradable plastics which incidentally are being promoted by the Delhi Government.     

The activists had questioned the viability of the clause (3) of Delhi Degradable Plastic Bag (manufacture, sale and usage) and garbage (control) Act 2000 which prohibits manufacture, sale or use of plastic bags other than degradable plastic bags.     

"Since no standard has been fixed regarding their degradibility and there is no research even in regard to the time taken for degradation the clause should be done away with," Jain submitted.     

While supporting virgin plastic, the panel recommended increase in the thickness of the plastic bags to 40 microns to make it more costly and discourage its indiscriminate use among the vendors. "It will also improve retrieval and recycling as rag-pickers would find it more remunerative," the panel said.     

Regarding usage of bio-degradable plastic, the report said it is costly and research on it is on a nascent stage.