Nearly
900 water packaging units remain shut; shortage anticipated
Several customers in the city
stocked up on packaged drinking water on Thursday anticipating a shortage due
to the ongoing indefinite strike by manufacturers.
Protesting the National Green
Tribunal’s directive on Wednesday to close over 252 units across the State,
members of the Tamil Nadu Packaged Drinking Water Manufacturers Association
started a strike.
Following this, several retailers
received more orders for bubbletops on Thursday. V. Murugan, a retailer in
Perambur, said he exhausted his stock as many residents had purchased two or
three bubbletops anticipating a shortage during the next few days.
Nearly 900 units across the State
remain closed since Wednesday evening. Of this, about 320 units are located in
and around Chennai.
Tamil Nadu Packaged Drinking Water
Manufacturers Association’s president V. Murali said the units were directed to
be closed as they were located in regions where groundwater resources was said
to be over-exploited. Of this, 12 were located around the city.
The association’s general secretary
A. Shakespeare said the units already had licences from the Bureau of Indian
Standards and Food Safety Standards Authority of India. “We are not a polluting
industry. The State government must provide us exemption from the licensing
system of Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board.” The association members had also
represented their issues to officials in the Chief Minister’s cell on Thursday,
he added.
While 3.5 crore litres of water is
supplied across the State every day, consumers from the city and its suburbs
consume nearly 90 lakh litres of packaged water daily. Nearly 90 per cent of
the supply is in the form of bubbletops.
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