Effect to
the Delhi Plastic Bags - Committee headed by Justice R.C. Chopra
11/25/2007
New Delhi : The Delhi
High Court has constituted an expert committee headed by a retired judge
to study
the extent of damage
plastic bags can cause to environment.
A division bench Justice
T.S. Thakur and Justice Veena Birbal Friday directed formation of the committee
headed by Justice (Retd)
R.C. Chopra for the study with the help of experts and environmentalists
and to
submit the report in
three months.
The chairmen of the Central
Pollution Control Board (CPCB) and the Delhi Pollution Control Committee
(DPCC) would be the other
members of the committee, which would have the help of the experts in the
field.
Directing the CPCB and
the DPCC to provide infrastructure and secretarial staff, the court said
the
committee would meet
twice every month to take stock of the situation.
During the hearing of
a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by Tapas, an NGO, to ban plastic
bags -
widely used for packing
goods bought at shops - in the capital, the court said the committee could
take the opinion and
expertise of the experts from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)
and other
institutes.
The high court in September
2006 had directed the Delhi government to give effect to the Delhi
Plastic Bags (Manufacture,
Sale and Usage) and Non-biodegradable Garbage (Control) Act immediately
banning non-biodegradable
plastic bags in the capital.
The court had asked the
government to consider the suggestion of the CPCB to recycle the used
plastic bags as material
in road construction.
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The CPCB had asked the
Jadavpur University
and the Thyagaraj Engineering
College of
Madurai to study the
re-usability of the plastic
bags. The study had suggested
that the used
plastic bags could be
used for constructing the
top layer of the road.
The amendment in the
Delhi Plastic Bags (Manufacture,
Sale and Usage) and Non-biodegradable
Garbage (Control) Act,
2003, had made it
mandatory for five-star
hotels, restaurants
with 100 seats and hospitals
with 100 beds in
Delhi to use only biodegradable
plastic bags.
But the law is not yet
implemented
in the capital, said
Vinod Jain of
Tapas in the petition |
Judge
Speaks (Justice R. C. Chopra)
burnt
meters -Justice R C Chopra
Note
On Disaster Management Plan by Justice R. C. Chopra
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