Pollution control board to incentivise environment compliance

NT Correspondent

Bengaluru: The Bangalore Chamber of Industry and Commerce (BCIC) organised an interactive session in compliance with Dr Shanth A Thimmaiah, who is the chairperson of Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB) on Friday here. Participants from various industries were present at the event that was an interactive one.

The discussion was aimed at filling the existing gap between policymakers and the industry in terms of pollution. Many queries in terms of pollution control were answered by Dr Shanth. According to him, there is a deficit of trust between industries and policymakers and due to this many cannot comprehend that pollution and production are dependent on each other and should be treated with equal attention.

“Doing this will promote sustainability.” He also said that after he became the chairman, he conducted industry-specific meetings to generate awareness and educate individuals hailing from different industries in 14 districts. He also shed light on the importance of pollution control and checking compliance as per needs of the legal document submitted by industries.

In order to implement the GreenCo rating certificate for industries, the KCPCB signed an MoU with CII. Industries that attain the certificate will be incentivised with a one-time cash prize, ranging from Rs 50,000 to Rs 10,00,000 and this will depend upon the scale and rating obtained by the industry. For the next financial year, an amount of Rs 2 crore has been sanctioned for the incentive scheme.

Dr L Ravindran, President BCIC said that the main goal of the session was to ponder upon expectations of the KSPCB and to synergise between the government and industries as a massive amount of sewage, municipal solid waste, industrial waste and so on are generated at a mass level, and in efforts to manage it, allegiance with the pollution board is integral.