Ggm's oldest mall sealed for violating pollution control rules

gurugram: Gurugram's oldest shopping mall and one of the most prominent ones in the National Capital Region - the Sahara Mall was on Monday sealed by officials of the Haryana State Pollution Control Board (HPSCB) for violating sewage treatment and discharge bylaws.

A team from the pollution control board along with duty magistrate Kartar Singh and pollution environment engineers Neha Saharan and Ujjwal Kumar reached the mall at around 7:30 am and sealed the entire complex. According to officials of the HSPCB, the sewage water must be treated before being

discharged.

Despite sending several warnings to the mall management, the water samples were failing every time they were tested by pollution control officials.

The management of Sahara Mall, according to HSPCB, was served the first show-cause notice regarding untreated sewage water in 2018 and fined Rs 2.5 lakh but even after almost two years, they have failed to rectify operations and were continuously being pulled up by state authorities for polluting the environment with toxic sewage

discharge.

Saying that the action of sealing Sahara Mall was conducted after several reminders, the HSPCB officials stated that mall authorities will now not only be fined but will also be instructed to pay environmental damage compensation with a formal complaint being registered against them with the state body.

"For long we were being criticised for being soft on the polluters. Today, we have taken action on some of the major polluters in the city. For long the management of Sahara Mall was ignoring notices. The inaction in rectifying the problem had resulted in pollution of water and ground that led us to seal the mall," said Kuldeep Singh, Officer, Haryana State Pollution Control Board Gurugram. The HSPCB is also planning to file a legal suit against the mall management, officials added.

With a large number of shops located inside the mall, there were also protests by the shopkeepers against the mall management.

"At a time we are just trying to recover our losses, we have been dealt another blow with the sealing of the mall. Paying the maintenance fee to the mall management, I expected that my money should have been used in trying to rectify the problem," said one of the shopkeepers in

Sahara Mall.