Caution: stored chemicals

8220;After we call it a day and go home, some of us either vomit or suffer from a nagging headache,8221; continues Rai.

Interestingly, barring the debris in an isolated corner, there aren8217;t many traces of the nightmarish incident. Yet, the moment you enter Dasnagar, a little-known industrial township in Howrah District, the moment you step off the local train or bus, a sweetish smell hits your nostrils. No one in Dasnagar knows what the implications of this mysterious smell are for their future. But it is a constant reminder of thepossibility that the Dasnagar tragedy could repeat itself at any time of day or night. Sunil Rai is not peddling a lie. Spend some 20 minutes in Dasnagar and you will soon be conscious of a nagging headache. Today, a few police constables guard the barricaded area of the godown for eight hours 8212; but it8217;s a bit like bolting the stable door after the horse has fled.

The fire of April 20 required 30 fire tenders battling over 15 hours to quell it. And although the fire may have been put out, controversy still clouds the air. Worse still, Dasnagar is a grim reflection of the state that Howrah 8212; Calcutta8217;s twin city 8212; finds itself in. Today, it is almost choking on its congestion and pollution.

Meanwhile the local authorities spend their time telling people that the area is free of any danger. But even as the local people are repeatedly told that air-pollution levels are fast returning to normal, an interesting battle is being fought between the West Bengal Pollution Control Board, Customs and the CalcuttaPort Trust as to who should bear the blame for the accident. Instead of getting on with the more crucial job of mapping the concentration of godowns in Howrah where dangerous and hazardous chemicals are stored, the authorities are busy passing the buck.

West Bengal Minister of Environment Manab Mukherjee, when contacted, chose the safe, bureaucratic way out: 8220;We would rather wait for the report of the committee the state government constituted to probe into the causes of fire and other aspects.8221; On being asked if his environment ministry had already begun cataloguing the godowns storing hazardous chemicals in view of the Dasnagar incident, Mukherjee shrugs: 8220;Only the Customs can have a definite list of such godowns.8221;

If the minister adopts such an attitude, is it any wonder that the agencies meant to handle the repercussions of the fire are equally lackadaisical? 8220;No one seems to be worried by the fact that we may not even have begun the preliminary work of compiling a list of such godowns,8221; quippedSubhas Datt, general secretary of the Howrah Ganatantik Nagarik Samiti.

Unofficial reports say that in West Bengal there are about 300 godowns which may house hazardous and dangerous chemicals and Howrah8217;s share of it could be anything from 200 to 210. Howrah, incidentally, happens to be one of West Bengal8217;s oldest industrial townships.

8220;We cannot go from door to door, collecting information about whose godown has what. It is the duty of other institutions, particularly the Customs, to inform the concerned authorities about the nature of the chemicals 8212; if they are among the 434 listed as hazardous and dangerous,8221; says K.S.Ramasubban, member-secretary of the State Pollution Control Board PCB.But the Customs, in turn, shrugs off all responsibility. Commissioner of Customs, S.P.S. Pundir, explains how the system works: 8220;Our job is to allow any importer, who cannot pay the import duty on his goods immediately after its arrival, to store them in one of the godowns for which we have a licence. And whileour clients settle for one such licensed godown, we keep the key to it since, legally, the goods cannot move without import duty clearance. We also investigate into whether the godown owner can pay back in the event of any damage, including pilferage.8221;

The Calcutta Port Trust is also trying to wriggle out of the Dasnagar fire mess. Says an official on condition of anonymity: 8220;Our duty ends the moment an importer removes his or her goods after completing the formalities. Isn8217;t it better to begin from where it all starts? The authorities who issue import licences for such hazardous chemicals should furnish the pollution monitoring agencies the list of such hazardous and dangerous chemicals.8221;Kalyan Bagchi, the state environment secretary, puts it more plainly: 8220;The Dasnagar incident does not necessitate a new set of laws. But at some point we will have to identify a particular department which has to handle this more systematically in terms of keeping a watch on such storage.8221; And even as the variousofficials spend their time passing the buck, Dasnagar itself continues to be a tinder-box.

Foam, not water

A section of the agencies that got involved with the Dasnagar incident blame the fire brigade and police for having mishandled the situation8217; by choosing the wrong medium 8212; water 8212; to extinguish the fire.

The water, as Commissioner of Customs S.P.S.Pandir pointed out, instantly aggravated the situation by enhancing the polluting potential of the burning chemicals.

If they had known what the chemicals stored were they would have used foam, not water, to quell the fire. As things turned out, three-chloro-four-fluoro aniline a halogenated aniline derivative, stored in huge quantities in the godown with other chemicals, created a great deal of havoc.

Incidentally, the aniline is listed as a hazardous chemical in the Schedule I of the Manufacture, Storage amp; Import of Hazardous Chemicals Rules MSIHCR, 1989.

A preliminary report of the West Bengal Pollution Control Board of April 29reveals that though 8220;the godown had storage of huge quantities of flammable items like aromatic oils and alcohols, synthetic rubbers, synthetic rugs industrial tallows among other chemicals, none of them belonged to the groups of compounds listed in MSIHCR.8221;

But the report adds that some of the chemicals, like methyl salicytate, stored in the godown, which is a basic ingredient for analgesic ointments like iodex, diethyl sulphate can greatly irritate the mucous membranes and cause serious respiratory problems, including pulmonary oedema in people exposed to very high concentrations of the substance.

And, not surprisingly, later a gas chromatographic analysis of the stagnant water in the area collected from a spot close to the godown showed the presence of halogenated aromatic aniline.