More than a month after an oil spill was detected on the eastern coast of Mumbai, local authorities have been using an ingenious device to clean up the spill: buckets.
The spill in question was caused by a pipeline owned by the Mumbai Port Trust, and was first reported by villagers in Mahul, near the eastern Mumbai suburb of Chembur, in late October.
It’s not clear when the spill actually happened, or what caused it, but it has spread to around ten acres of land comprising ecologically-sensitive mangrove forests, according to the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board.
Typically, the Mumbai Port Trust appoints companies to clean up spills, but in this case it didn’t appoint one, at least until recently. Over the last few weeks, some of its employees have been using buckets to remove oil that has spread to mangroves and parts of the coastline, according to local environmentalists and the Port Trust.
The incident underscores the lack of an effective system to clean up oil spills in India, say environmentalists.
“No one is willing to take responsibility, no one wants to pay for the spill,” said Debi Goenka, a Mumbai-based environmentalist. He added that there aren’t enough systems in place to monitor pipelines and prevent leakages.
In Mahul, the slow pace of clean-up is damaging the mangroves and hurting the livelihood of hundreds of fishermen as the oil has killed the fish in the area, said Stalin Dayanand, a social worker at nature conservancy organization Vanashakti, who is closely monitoring developments in the region.
“People have lost at least three months’ livelihood,” said Rajendra Mahulkar, a local politician from Mahul.
Over the last few decades, Mumbai has been the victim of several oil spills that have hurt its marine life and the livelihoods of those dependent on fishing. In October, more than 1,000 litres of oil poured into the Arabian Sea — on the outskirts of Mumbai — when a pipeline belonging to the state-owned Oil & Natural Gas Corp. leaked.
In India, the ultimate responsibility of cleaning oil spills rests with the Coast Guard, which in turn, co-ordinates with local port authorities and oil companies whose oil is spilled.
In the Mahul leak, the Mumbai Port Trust was expected to clean the spill because it was caused by pipeline in an area controlled by the Trust. Port Trust Secretary P. Mohana Chandran told The Wall Street Journal that the clean-up has taken “a little more time than it should have been ideally.”
Mr. Chandran said that Port Trust had invited bids last year to employ a company that cleans up spills, but had rejected all bids due to “technical issues.” He declined to elaborate. Mr. Chandran added that the Trust has recently appointed a company to clear the Mahul spill, but didn’t specify when they would begin work.
A spokesman for Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd., a state-run company whose oil was being carried in the pipeline, said that it had suggested names of several clean-up companies to the port authority.
An official of the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board, P. K. Mirashe, told The Wall Street Journal it was mulling over what action it should take against the port authority for its “slow response.” For now, the Trust has been asked to provide weekly updates on how the leak is being cleaned up, said Mr. Mirashe.
Environmentalists say that there aren’t any serious consequences of delays in cleaning spills.
The Pollution Control Board has “teeth that can’t bite,” said Mr. Dayanand, the environmentalist, adding that in the past, no government agency has been prosecuted.
–Shanoor Seervai contributed to this post.follow @WSJIndia