The costs of water pollution in India

Unless there have been some environment related acts in India as early as the nineteenth century, 

the first significant laws  regarding the protection  of environmental resources appeared in the 

1970's with the setting up of a National Comimittee on Environmental Planning and

Coordination, and the enactment of the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972. 

Since then, three  main texts have been passed at the central level, that are relevant to  water

pollution :   the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1974, the Water (Prevention 

and Control of Pollution) Cess Act, 1977 and the Environment (Protection) Act (1986). 

The Water Act 1974 established the Pollution Control Boards at the central and state level.   

The Water Cess Act 1977 provided the Pollution Control Boards with a funding tool, enabling 

them to charge the water user with a cess designed as a financial support for the board's activities. 

The Environment Protection Act 1986 is an umbrella legislation providing a single focus in the 

country for the protection of environment and seeks to plug the loopholes of earlier legislation 

relating to environment.  

The law prohibits the pollution of water bodies and requires any potentially polluting activity to

get the consent of the local SPCB before being started. 

Composition : Each board is composed of a chairman and five  members, with agriculture 

fisheries, and government-owned industries having representation.  

                 

The CPCB has overshight powers over the various state boards. It sets emission standards, and 

lays down ambient standards. The CPCB also conducts nation wide surveys about the status of

pollution, and of pollution mitigation. 

Two programs of inland water quality monitoring have been  set up so far, leading to the 

spreading of  480 measurement stations over the  main river basins of the country. These two

programs are the Global  Environment Monitoring System (GEMS) and Monitoring of Indian

Aquatic Resources (MINARS). The ganga river is subject to a dedicated program called Ganga 

Action Plan (GAP) under which a water quality control network as been set up in the ganga basin. 

The measurement are made in different kind of medium (river, wells, lakes, creeks, ponds, tanks, 

drains and canals) and 25 physico-chemical and biological parameters are monitored. 

The implementation of the national environmental laws, and the enforcement of the standards set

by the CPCB is decentralised at the level of each state, with the SPCB in charge of this role. The

SPCB can demand information from any industry about the  compliance  with the Act. Non-

2compliance can be punished with fines up to Rs. 10000, and imprisonment up to three months. In

case of continued non-compliance, an additional  daily fine of  5000 Rs. can be imposed. Until 

1988, the only enforcement tool of the SPCB was criminal prosecution. This was revised by the 

1988 amendment to the Water Act of 1974. The  boards now  have the power to close noncompliant companies or to cut their  water and power supply. The ultimate recourse remains 

public interest litigation in front on the supreme court. During the last decade, the supreme court 

has been involved several times in large scale environment related measures. In April 1995 for 

example, the Supreme Court of India, in a public interest litigation case, has ordered that 538 

tanneries located in 3 clusters in Calcutta generating about 30 mld of effluents be shifted from the 

city to a leather complex and a CETP (Common Effluent Treatment Plant)be provided to treat the

effluent generated from the complex. In 1996, it has ordered the closure of all tanneries in Tamil 

Nadu that had not set up pollution control systems.

However, control and sanction is not the only way of interaction between the boards and the 

polluting entities. Under the Water  Cess Act of 1977 state boards  may charge industries and 

municipalities with a water cess calculated on the volume of water consumed, and for consent

fees. Nevertheless any fee levied by the SPCBs have to be sent to the central government. The 

central government is then supposed to return 80% of the fees to the SPCBs