Petition sent to the TNPCB Chairman seeking answers on the issue P. Sankara Narayanan, an environmental activist hailing from agrarian community in the region, has decided to implead in one of the recent Public Interest Litigations (PIL) filed in Supreme Court, in an attempt to fight the continuing industrial pollution in Tirupur knitwear cluster. “I am going to implead in the PIL filed by the Gujarat-based Paryavaran Suraksha Samithi (PSS) and the Farmers' Action Group (FAG), which is a petition sought to implement the existing pollution control norms as well as 'polluters pay' principle across the country. In the case of Tirupur too, the Supreme Court has already mentioned of the 'polluters pay' principle. But the Common Effluent Treatments have been given grants by the government machinery to help them comply with pollution norms,” Mr.Narayanan told The Hindu. On the litigations by PSS and FAG, the apex court, in December, has sent notices to the Centre and Chief Secretaries of 19 States, including Tamil Nadu, in which 'critically' and 'severely' polluted clusters were located. “Since Tirupur was named as one of the polluted clusters, it has to be brought to the notice of the apex court that the effluents from industrial units in Tirupur are still polluting the water bodies like River Noyyal”, he said. “This is evident from the fact that the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board has caught almost 100 dyeing units in 2013 calendar year alone for discharging untreated effluents into the water bodies in and around Tirupur,” Mr. Narayanan pointed out. Mr. Narayanan, who is also an engineer, had sent a petition to the TNPCB Chairman seeking answers for few queries as a prelude to impleading in the case . “I have sought answers on why the 'trial run' to test the efficiency of the Common Effluent Treatment Plants in Tirupur is allowed to continue for more than two years and has sought answers for allowing the commercial dyeing operations in the pretext of trial runs,” he said. He said that the answers or 'no answers' from TNPCB would be included in the impleader procedure. “ Common Effluent Treatments given grants by the government to help them comply with pollution norms”