HUL settles dispute with Kodaikanal unit staff

The staff had claimed to have been affected by mercury exposure and had sought economic rehabilitation

Hindustan Unilever (HUL) and the Pond’s HLL ex-Mercury Employees Welfare Association, representing workers at the multinational’s now-closed thermometer factory in Kodaikanal, Tamil Nadu, both announced the signing of a agreement to settle a long-running dispute on the union’s demand for compensation and rehabilitation.

It was signed last Friday and the settlement was recorded in an order passed by the high court here. HUL will make payment to 591 former workers or association members and their families, for ‘livelihood enhancement projects and skill enhancement programmes’, said the company. The sum to be spent was not disclosed; it was given to the court in a sealed cover. Advocates on the dispute told reporters “it’s a huge amount”.

The company has to give a compliance report to the court by March 28, according to sources. The employees’ petition was filed in 2006, well after HUL had made a ‘full and final’ legal settlement in November 2001, said the company.

“The settlement has been entered into on humanitarian considerations, to put an end to this long-standing matter...and in keeping with the suggestion of the high court,” stated HUL.

 

Dev Bajpai, its executive director, legal and corporate, said: “We have worked hard over many years to address this and find the right solution for our former workers.” S A Mahindra Babu, president of the union, said: “We are pleased with all the terms of the agreement...we now consider this issue to be fully resolved.” Accordingly, the 2006 petition would be withdrawn.

However, environmental bodies, which had joined the union's struggle for compensation, while acknowledging the agreement as "unprecedented victory", also declared they'd be continuing their demand that HUL clean the toxic mercury residue at the factory site, about 1.5 km from the town, on the southern crest of the upper Palani hills.  At least 15 such non-government bodies had been after HUL on both demands, on staff compensation for both loss of jobs and exposure to mercury, and site clean-up.  

In 1982, Pond’s moved its thermometer factory to Kodaikanal from America, after the plant owned there by its parent, Chesebrough-Pond's, had to be dismantled. Many people in the area here had left their farms and became workers at the factory. It was taken over by HUL in 1987, when its parent, Unilever, acquired Cheseborough-Pond’s globally. Between 1984 and 1989, the factory was firing on all cylinders. Workers came in two shifts of 200 each.

Over time, at least 1,000 people had worked in this factory. However, the facility was closed in 2001.

The dispute had ecology activists mobilising outside India as well, due to the campaign by non-government organisations (NGOs). Leading campaigners  — The Other Media, Chennai Solidarity Group, Jhatkaa.org -- declared the latest development to be “an unprecedented victory and a fitting culmination of the 15-year campaign by workers and the hundreds of thousands of supporters worldwide...it is public outrage, not corporate responsibility, that prompted Unilever to do what it had refused to do for 15 years”.

“The much-delayed settlement is great news but Unilever still has unfinished business in Kodaikanal. You can expect a high-decibel global campaign in the coming months to ensure Unilever cleans up its mercury contaminated site to international standards,” said Nityanand Jayaraman, a Chennai-based writer and activist, who has been part of the campaign since 2001.

Music rapper Sofia Ashraf has lately made news with a well-circulated 'Kodaikanal won't step down' video, after which the HUL management had said it would be addressing the matter at the earliest.

HUL has stated, while annnouncing the settlement, that it had given a Detailed Project Report to the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board in August 2015 and was awaiting the latter's response on issues related to soil remediation within the factory site.

According to earlier reports, the company admitted that scrap from the plant was sold illegally to a dealer near the facility when it was closed down in 2001. The company on its website states the recovered glass scrap was sent to the US for recycling in 2003. And, in 2006, the plant, machinery and materials used in thermometer manufacturing at the site were decontaminated and disposed as scrap to industrial recyclers.

The company earlier said there was no adverse impact on the health of employees or the environment. There was limited impact on the soil at some spots within the premises which required remediation, it said.

However, the NGOs allege Unilever is leaving up to 25 mg/kg of mercury in the soil – 250 times higher than naturally occurring background levels -- even after its clean-up. According to activists, that is far laxer than global standards and will harm the environment. The ex-factory is located on a ridge surrounded by the densely forested Kodaikanal Wildlife Sanctuary.