Andhra Pradesh’s Industrial Safety Panel Faces Flak
High-level committee was formed after the Atchutapuram SEZ accident
Visakhapatnam: A high-level committee set up by the state government earlier this year to study and recommend steps for industrial safety is facing flak over its composition and "ineffective" style of functioning.
Following the reactor explosion at Essentia AS company in August that killed 17 workers and injured over 30 persons, the state Industries department issued an order (GO-51) on Sept 13. It was aimed at implementing steps to prevent future industrial accidents. Alongside this, the government set up a high-level committee to oversee the implementation of the safety steps.
Comprising 11 officers, the committee held its first meeting at a corporate hotel in Vizag. After this, Gani Shetty Satyanarayana, honorary president of the Parma City staff and workers union, expressed frustration over the way the committee members conducted themselves.
“We want to interact with these members and share our observations regarding these accidents, but the members are inaccessible. They visited Atchutapuram SEZ only once. We don’t know what their observations are,” Satyanarayana told Deccan Chronicle.
In a letter to the government, former bureaucrat EAS Sharma has also criticised the high-level committee. He said the committee members lacked a thorough understanding of global safety protocols in the chemical industry. Despite having representatives from IIT (Chennai), IIT (Tirupati) and Niti Aayog, these members “lacked hands-on safety protocol experience.”
“Additionally, more than five committee members are representatives of industries where accidents are frequent, raising doubts about the committee's effectiveness,” he said.
The high-level committee was given three months to submit its report. Director of Factories, Chandrashekhar Verma responded, "We have been given a time of three months. The first meeting was held in Visakhapatnam. Union leaders who want to meet us should inform us by email. If they have any suggestions, they can send these to us through email, we will go through them."
"We are visiting factories across the state to collect data. Once we finish the work, we will prepare a comprehensive report and submit it to the government," he said.