The Hindu Business Line : Dumping of a different kind

IT is garbage that has arrived under the garb of used paper. At the receiving end is the public sector Hindustan Newsprint Ltd (HNL) in Kottayam district of Kerala.

A portion of an import consignment reportedly shipped from New York to the Kochi port recently has turned out to be garbage, which included all kinds of municipal waste.

Though the HNL management declined to divulge more details on the matter, the consignment was said to be a regular cargo meant for re-cycling in its de-inking plant.

Confirming the arrival of the shipment at the Kochi port, senior port officials said that it had received from two shipping lines about 1,000 tonnes of cargo in 40 forty-foot containers. Of this, one shipping line brought in about 16 boxes containing mostly garbage with waste products. However, in the bill of lading the cargo was mentioned as "office grade paper".

HNL had taken five containers from the port to its premises after paying the necessary duties to the port. On realising the nature of the material inside the boxes, it rejected the remaining consignment putting the shipping lines concerned in the dock forcing them to pay ground rent and demurrages to the port.

When contacted, the HNL authorities were reluctant to say anything in detail. "As the cargo is not acceptable to us, we have rejected it. It is lying with the port now and it is up to them to take action," a top company official said. He also declined to comment on taking legal action against the company in the US that supplied the cargo.

However, port officials were of the view that they had nothing to do with the issue since the port was only acting as a "service providing authority". It has no role to inspect the cargo coming to the port in sealed containers. As the cargo was meant for factory de-stuffing, even the Customs authorities had no role to examine it in the wharf, the officials said.

Meanwhile, one of the shipping lines has obtained permission from the State Pollution Control Board to destroy the cargo by burning it. It has identified a wasteland for this purpose.

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