Rights-based organisation Human Rights Forum (HRF) has demanded that the Andhra Pradesh government halt the ethanol plant under construction by Assago Industries Private Limited in Gokavaram mandal of East Godavari district. The demand comes amid a series of protests, demanding the closure of Assago’s plant in Gummalladoddi, the village in East Godavari where the ethanol plant is located. Following the protests, a three-member fact-finding committee from HRF visited the village to understand Gummalladoddi’s concerns.
Assago Industries had announced the setting up of an ethanol-producing plant at the Andhra Pradesh Industrial Infrastructure Corporation (APIIC) Industrial Park in Gummalladoddi village at an investment of Rs 270 crore in 2022 when the YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) led by former Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy was in power. According to the company, the greenfield project was a grain-based zero liquid discharge plant and promised to generate employment for over 100 direct and 400 indirect jobs.
After the plant was constructed, Assago started production of approximately 2 lakh litres of ethanol from October 2024. Assago is currently also constructing a carbon dioxide plant on the same premises.
Residents of Gummalladoddi as well as nearby villages of Atchutapuram, Bawajipeta, and Vedurupaka have been protesting against the plant since October 21, 2024, raising concerns over air and water pollution. HRF argued that the ethanol plant had the potential to contaminate the nearby Purushothapatnam Lift Irrigation canal due to groundwater pollution. Assago Industries has been extracting groundwater to produce ethanol.
Gummalladoddi residents raise issues
The village residents first protested against the plant as they were unable to bear the noise and stench coming from the ethanol plant. “Ideally, the state pollution control board should explain the stench and clarify that it has nothing to do with emissions. They didn’t do that. If ethanol plants are set up anywhere, state pollution control boards and the Union Environment Ministry tend to show volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and formaldehyde emissions as zero instead of disclosing the actual percentage of harmful emissions. This is happening in Gummalladoddi as well,” Babu Rao Kalpala, a former scientist with the Indian Institute of Chemical Technology, told TNM.
The Assago plant is set up in the same compound as an Indian Oil refinery. Facing the compound on the other side, Hindustan Petroleum has set up a refinery of its own. HRF argued that farmers don’t burn any waste owing to the presence of oil refineries.
“Setting up an ethanol plant in the compound of an oil refinery is criminally negligent and dangerous. Residents aren’t allowed by officials to burn crackers during Deepavali or even burn stubble in the fields because of the close proximity to the oil refinery. How are they allowed to construct an ethanol plant, which is easily flammable?” HRF asked.
“Everyone thought at first that a vittanalu (seeds) factory was being set up because it sounds similar to ethanol. We didn’t think it was a petrochemical plant. Once we knew, we started protesting. Each time we protested against the plant, we were detained,” Krishna Prasad, a native of Gummalladoddi, told TNM.
“A 17-year-old boy in our village kept falling sick and suffered from severe migraines after the ethanol production started. When we approached doctors in Rajahmundry, they told us that he should be shifted out of the village as the smell is affecting his health,” Krishna Prasad added.
HRF’s fact committee raised another key issue. Public hearings have been a mandatory part of Category A and Category B1 of the environmental clearance process under the provisions of the Environmental (Protection) Act, 1986. Ethanol is a petrochemical and, as such, falls under Category A, also identified as a ‘red category industry’ under the Water Act, 1974, and the Air Act, 1981.
However, this changed in January 2019. “The Andhra Pradesh government did not hold any public hearing on the establishment of the plant because the Union ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change in 2019 exempted blended ethanol plants from public hearings," Gutta Rohit, state secretary of the Human Rights Forum (HRF) and a member of the fact-finding committee told TNM.
Rohit also raised another issue. “As per the Central Pollution Control Board and Union Ministry of Environment, Forest, and Climate Change guidelines, 33% of the total land area should be kept as a green belt (total green cover inside the project area). I don’t think they have even 3% green cover,” he remarked.
“The state government acquired our land to set up Indian Oil in 1996. Residents of Gummalladoddi happily worked there and also continued farming. There wasn’t any problem. About 23 acres of the land were vacant in the compound and were supposed to be used as a parking space. We gave up our land for an oil company, not a petrochemical company,” Krishna Prasad said.
