Multinational soft drink giant Coca-Cola, which has its factory and bottling plant in the drought-prone Perumatty village of Chittur taluka of Palakkad district of Kerala, is being accused by villagers and politicians of depleting and polluting the drinking water resources in about 10 km radius around the factory.
The factory situated on a 40-acre plot was commissioned in 1988-89 to supply the soft drink brands to the Kerala and Tamil Nadu markets.
Addressing mediapersons on Saturday, the Opposition leader Achuthananadan demanded that the Kerala government should commission a study to assess the actual water requirement of the Coke factory and analyse how it was affecting the water table in the area. The study should also confirm whether the unit was violating any law, he pointed out.
The government should also take steps to ensure that the water resources in the Chittur taluka area do not dry up due to the large quantity of water consumed by the Coke factory, he added.
Emphasising that the unit had itself admitted consuming between 3 to 5 lakh litres of water every day, he said, the consumption of Coca-Cola could satisfy the needs of 15,000 to 20,000 persons per day.
Achuthanandan, who had visited the Coca-Cola factory earlier in the day, was taken around the water harvesting plant set up in the factory premises and explained the steps taken to treat the water and use it for watering the plants.
The company officials had also tried to impress the Opposition leader saying that the factory was providing permanent employment to 130 people and indirect employment to around 1,000 persons. The unit had also spent Rs 6 crore to erect an effluent treatment plant solely to check water pollution, they pointed out.
The company had also paid more than Rs 21 crore as excise duties and around Rs 2 crore as sales tax during the last financial year, they
added.
While the company officials also claimed that recognising its corporate responsibility Coke had also supplied water to the whole panchayat during the last summer season, the labour unions speaking on behalf of the company authorities alleged that the strikes against the factory were being organized by some vested interests with a view to extract money from the management.
Though representatives of the CITU, INTUC, HMS and BMS unions said that the Coke plant should be allowed to continue functioning, nearly 1000 families, mainly tribals of the area, have been demanding that the company should close down its factory without further delay. In June this year, they had also resorted to a month-long agitation and sat on sathyagraha in front of the multinational factory.
Emphasising that the Coke plant has been drawing the major chunk of the ground water from the area, a spokesperson of the Adivasi Action Council alleged that it had dried up the wells, ponds and two large reservoirs and paddy fields. The water in the area has also become salty, he added.
