The Supreme Court on an appeal filed by the Water Quality India Association has issued notices to the Central government ministries against the National Green Tribunal (NGT) order by which it had ordered to ban water purifiers where the level of total dissolved solids (TDS) in water are below 500 mg per litre.
A bench of Justices SA Nazeer and Krishna Murari issued notices to the Ministry of Water Resources, Ministry of Environment and Forests, Central Pollution Control Board, and others on the appeal.
The top court has asked them to file their responses within three weeks.
It has also stayed the order of the NGT where it ordered that the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) to issue directions to all RO manufacturers to ban water purifiers where the level of TDS in water is below 500 milligrams per litre.
The Water Quality India Association, representing the RO manufacturers, has challenged in the apex court the December 1, 2021 order of the NGT.
NGT in its border had said, "There is no provision for regulating and prohibiting RO systems where TDS is less than 500 mg/l, as directed by this Tribunal. There is also no supply chain management of the RO reject. Similarly, water wastage issue remains unaddressed."
The green panel had said that huge wastage of water in the use of RO purifiers merely for advancing the commercial interest of companies at the cost of public interest needs to be checked.
The green tribunal in a bid to regulate the use of RO purifiers had directed the government to prohibit them where TDS is below 500 mg per litre and to sensitise the public about the ill-effects of demineralised water.
The order of the NGT had come after perusing an expert committee report which said that if TDS is less than 500 milligrams per litre, a RO system will not be useful but will result in removing important minerals as well as cause undue wastage of water. It was hearing a plea filed by NGO Friends seeking conservation of potable water by preventing its wastage on account of unnecessary use of RO systems.
( With inputs from ANI )
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