Borewell water drawn in Dattanagar, a residential pocket beside the Ambad MIDC industrial estate in Nashik, contains hexavalent chromium at about 1,000 times the drinking-water limit, according to a lab result released on October 8 by the river-research network SANDRP. The Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB) has since issued closure directions to nine industrial units in the estate, the Free Press Journal reported on October 11.
What the test found
SANDRP’s Parineeta Dandekar collected a sample from a home borewell where the water had turned bright yellow, and an accredited Nashik laboratory measured 50.3 mg/L of hexavalent chromium, out of 50.5 mg/L total chromium. The Bureau of Indian Standards caps chromium in drinking water at 0.05 mg/L. SANDRP’s note names electroplating, metal-finishing and paint units in the estate as likely sources. PTI carried the findings nationally on October 11.
One sample cannot map how far the contamination has spread underground or pin it on a particular factory. Only the MPCB’s own testing, or an independent government survey, can settle those questions, and the board has not published its results.
How the regulator got here
The paper trail runs back to summer. The MPCB served a show-cause notice on M/s Aarti Structures Pvt Ltd, a unit on Plot E-91/B, on July 7, and the company did not reply, the Free Press Journal reported. Board inspectors visited on September 28 and found its effluent treatment plant out of action, its zero-liquid-discharge system switched off, and yellow wastewater running into a drain towards houses. A fresh notice under the Water and Air Acts followed on September 30, with 15 days to respond, so the deadline falls around October 15.
Mayor Himgauri Aher-Adke toured Dattanagar on October 1 and ordered the civic body to sample wells and borewells. Guardian Minister Girish Mahajan visited later, and the MPCB moved from notices to shutdowns: four units had already been told to close, and five more received closure directions.
Last month, Mumbai police traced the Goregaon public toilet deaths to fumes from an electroplating unit. Plating shops handle chromium and cyanide compounds, which is why their effluent permits carry strict treatment conditions.
What it means for people in Ward 27
The local report puts the affected population at about 25,000, across Maruti Sankul, Dattanagar, the Tuljabhavani area and lanes near the Navnath Maharaj temple. Families there use borewells because Nashik Municipal Corporation supply arrives irregularly. Residents have reported itching, rashes and blisters; SANDRP also recorded swollen lymph nodes and two miscarriages, though it says any link to the water needs medical assessment.
If you live in the area, a few steps make sense while the official reports are pending:
- Stop using yellow or foul-smelling borewell water for drinking or cooking. Boiling does not remove dissolved metals such as chromium.
- Ask your ward office in writing for tanker supply, and keep a copy. SANDRP and residents have demanded daily tankers from the NMC and the collectorate.
- Get skin lesions or ulcers seen at a civic or government hospital, and mention the water source so doctors record it.
- Ask the corporator for the results of the samples the mayor ordered on October 1.
The Kumbh question and what to watch
SANDRP says the polluted water reaches the Godavari through a nala that opens at a Kumbh ghat. The Simhastha flag hoisting on October 31 starts a year of mass bathing on that river, which gives the state a hard reason to act within weeks.
Watch for three things: whether the MPCB and NMC release their test data, whether Aarti Structures answers its notice by mid-October, and whether the long-proposed common effluent treatment plant for Ambad gets a start date. Environmentalists pressed Divisional Commissioner Pravin Gedam on that plant in early October.
Sources: SANDRP, Free Press Journal, Deccan Chronicle (PTI)
This report was written with AI assistance from the publicly reported sources linked here; each fact was cross-checked against at least two of them.