Ten people died of suffocation while passing through a water channel that carried chemical waste. PHOTO: FILE
The Peshawar High Court (PHC) has ordered the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government to provide a complete report of the Chashma Sugar Mill incident in DI Khan that took the lives of 10 people due to poisonous waste material.
A two-member bench of Chief Justice (CJ) Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Malik Manzoor Hussain has ordered the provincial chief secretary, secretary home, secretary environment, secretary industries and chief executive of the Chashma Sugar Mill to submit a complete report of the incident within 15 days.
On May 2, at least 10 people died of suffocation and nine others fell unconscious while passing through a water channel that carried chemical waste from Chashma Sugar Mills-II to the Indus River.
CJ Miankhel directed that the report should contain the reasons behind the incident, whether a laboratory analysis was taken of the waste material and a complete report of post-mortems of the deceased. The CJ showed displeasure over the release of Rs100,000 to the families of the deceased, terming it a very low price for precious human life.
A complaint was filed by Muhammad Hashim of DI Khan at the Directorate of Human Rights in PHC, which has now been converted to a writ petition. The application reads that legal heirs of the deceased have stated that the sugar mill administration was contacted previously to dispose of the poisonous waste properly, but no action was taken despite them confirming on March 31 that it will be done within 15 days.
In the FIR that was filed, the complainant said agriculture was their only source of earning and because of the sugar mill, the only spring in the area was now poisoned. The complainant requested for justice and strict action to be taken.
The application was referred to Senior Civil Judge DI Khan Azimullah Mishwani with directions to record the statements of affected people.
Published in The Express Tribune, May 16th, 2014.
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