TSPCB orders compliance after Sigachi explosion exposes regulatory neglect
Hyderabad: Sigachi Industries, the company which saw nearly 40 of its workers killed in a massive explosion at its Pashamylaram factory in Sangareddy district, not only appears to have become the poster boy for such disasters in companies involved in manufacturing pharma and other products using various chemicals as raw materials, but also prompted the Telangana Pollution Control Board to wake up to one of its primary responsibilities, that of enforcing factories to display to public, the full details of the pollution they may cause to the environment.
Soon after the June 30 morning’s explosion in the Sigachi factory, top TSPCB officials rushed to the incident site for an inspection. Along with the dust, chemical fumes, confusion, deaths and injuries at the site, what greeted them was an empty proforma environmental data display board bereft of any data that every factory is mandatorily required to post to keep public informed of its environmental pollution potential, and steps it takes to keep a check on this front.
While the TSPCB team is learnt to have concluded that there was no immediate serious environmental fallout from the explosion and did not issue any public alert on this matter, what the Board did was to rush out a circular to all its regional offices to ensure that every industry and factory installs such environmental data display boards, and more importantly, fill the required data on the boards.
And compliance of the instructions must be reported back to the TSPCB headquarters within 15 days, the circular, dated June 28, 2025, with a dispatch date of June 30, said.
Incidentally, a similar circular, with a similar deadline, was issued by the TSPCB on August 19, 2020, mandating installation of the display boards, but had said that this was required to furnish the information to the National Green Tribunal, which sought compliance reports on this matter.
While the August 2020 circular from the TSPCB to its regional offices did not specify what information must be displayed on the boards, the one sent on June 30, the day of the Sigachi blast, was also specific in pointing out all the information that the boards must have on them.
Multiple sources thoroughly familiar with the ways of the TSPCB revealed that very few, if any, industries or factories, put out their pollution data on a daily basis as required under the law on the boards that are to be fixed outside their main entrance gates. “No one in the PCB actually cares about such matters. If the contrary was the case, then the board at Sigachi would have had the data,” a source explained.
When pointed out that it had been raining and that any data written on the board may have washed off, the source laughed it off, saying every factory management knows that display boards must be ‘all-weather’.
Revealing that the TSPCB has no data whatsoever on how many factories or industries even have a display board outside their gates, let alone following the rules on filling up the data, the source said “if they have to do this, then air, water, noise, and hazard waste generation monitoring equipment is needed. Or they can hire services of a third-party monitoring agency. And both mean additional expenses. No one wants to do this as once it is done, they can be held accountable even by a common person who has daily access to the data, can question its validity and so on.”
Infograph
Environmental data display boards
There must be two — One for air, water pollution, second for hazardous wastes.
Data needed — Consent orders dates, validity, order numbers
For hazardous waste — Point of disposal information
Water — Effluent description, prescribed standards — Quantity generated, quality achieved, disposal point
Air – Prescribed standards, stack monitoring data, ambient air quality standards, achieved quality
Noise – Prescribed standards, achieved standards
Large industries must have digital boards, medium, small industries to have 6ft x 4 ft boards
