HC doubles compensation for deaths due to pesticide

Nagpur: The Nagpur bench of Bombay High Court on Thursday directed the Maharashtra government to double the compensation payable to kin of those who died due to accidental pesticide inhalation last year at Rs4 lakh each.
The victims’ kin have also been allowed to drag government officials including the chief secretary, to the court if they feel that the amount is not enough to make good their loss. The government has been asked to complete a departmental inquiry against the concerned officials responsible for the disaster within six weeks. It was also told to file criminal offences if serious cases of negligence by the authorities was found during the probe.

A division bench comprising justices Bhushan Dharmadhikari and Swapna Joshi, further directed the government to have a uniform policy for declaring compensations in such cases. The District Legal Aid Service Authority (DLSA) here was told to conduct awareness programmes for farmers for safely using insecticides before the onset of monsoon.

Disposing of a PIL filed by social activist Jammu Anand on the matter, the court directed the government to complete all within six weeks. The victims will be able to draw their estimate of losses and move to the court against state’s chief secretary, principal secretary (agriculture), agriculture commissioner and Yavatmal collector, seeking a higher amount.

Earlier, the petitioner’s counsel Arvind Waghmare had argued that the Rs2 lakh announced earlier was too less considering the families’ losses. Former advocate general Sunil Manohar appointed by the government as special counsel, submitted documents related to SIT, as directed by the HC on Wednesday.

Last year, during July to December, 52 deaths took place in the region due to accidental inhalation of pesticide. Majority of the victims were farm labourers engaged in the cotton fields of Yavatmal district.

The PIL was filed seeking setting up of a SIT to probe the pesticide deaths. The panel headed by divisional commissioner (Amravati) Piyush Singh submitted its report on January 27. The report had however not fixed the responsibility of any of the official. On this, the petitioner had sought a judicial inquiry into the matter.

Soon after the deaths, the government banned five chemical formulations of pesticides were banned. However, the prohibition was for a period of 60 days as a permanent ban needs and order from the centre. The HC asked the government to put up a report to the union government as well as the Central Insecticide Board seeking a permanent ban on the chemicals.

In his application, the petitioner demanded to permanently ban the use of BT Cotton seeds and also pesticides referred by the SIT in its report. Accusing the local and state authorities of committing contempt of court, he said they failed to comply with HC’s October 6 directives, where they were directed to ban the deadly insecticides with immediate effect.