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Notably, the management of e-waste in the country is regulated by the E-Waste (Management) Rules, 2016. The Union government informed the Lok Sabha on Monday that 29 cases of illegal import of e-waste have been detected across the country since 2019. The government placed the data in response to a question raised by Congress MP TN Prathapan.
Going by the figures, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra each reported 11 cases of illegal e-waste detection. The southern state of Tamil Nadu reported nine cases in 2020-2021 and two cases in 2021-2022 (till February). Whereas Maharashtra registered three cases in 2019-2020, one in 2020-2021 and seven cases in 2021-2022. Among other states, Uttar Pradesh detected one case in 2019-2020, none in 2020-2021 and one in 2021-2022. Gujarat registered three cases of illegal e-waste detection, with two in 2019-2020 and one in 2021-2022. Finally, West Bengal reported two cases in 2020-2021. The illegal shipments primarily included old and used photocopiers and computer parts.
However, the IT capital of the country, Bengaluru, did not report any such cases.
The Minister of State in the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Ashwini Kumar Choubey, said, βThe Central Board of Indirect Taxes & Customs (CBIC) further informed that all field formations and Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) under the CBIC keep constant vigil to check illegal import of e-waste into India and take action in accordance with law whenever such contraventions are noticed.β
Notably, the management of e-waste in the country is regulated by the E-Waste (Management) Rules, 2016. The responsibility of disposal of e-waste in a scientific and environmentally sound manner has been assigned to the producers of notified electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) under the principle of extended producer responsibility (EPR).
Under the EPR regime, producers of EEE have been given annual e-waste collection and recycling targets.
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