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A bench of Justices R Subbiah and Krishnan Ramasamy of the Madras High Court upheld the order of the Tamil Nadu Government of banning the use of throwaway plastic. The order had come into force on January 1 this year. The bench criticized the poor implementation of the order as plastic products were still freely available.
The Court ordered the state government to stop supplying 'Aavin' brand milk in plastic packets and instead use bottles or find any other means while attending to a batch of PILs from Chennai Non-Woven’s Private Limited and 29 others.
The PILs sought to quash the June 25, 2018 government order of the state Environment and Forest Department and a consequential letter of December 8, 2018 in so far as it banned non-woven polypropylene carry bags. It also sought to receive a direction from the government to not interfere with the petitioners' manufacturing, storing, supplying and trading of the products.
The Court rejected the petitioner’s argument that the State Government was not empowered to impose the ban as it found that the Government derived its powers under Section 5 of the Environment (Protection) Act. Apart from this, the Tamil Nadu state government also was competent to impose the plastic ban in view of Articles 48A and 256 of the Constitution of India.
The bench remarked that in spite of the ban, one-time throwaway plastics were freely made available for use and unless hefty fines were imposed on suppliers or stockists, the ban could not be made effective or complete. The Court said that plastic had infiltrated and intruded into our daily lives in ways which it was not intended to and this has “in fact sounded a death knell to our ecology and environment.” The Court said that the state should promote alternative products such as cloth or jute bags in the larger interest of protecting the environment from being hampered.
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