LLM Group 6 Environment and Legal Order Prevention and Control of Pollution 2018 Question Paper with Solutions

Plastic waste. Carry bags, packaging, sachets and single-use items. Plastic waste reported by State Boards rose from about 33.6 lakh tonnes in 2018-19 to about 41.4 lakh tonnes in 2022-23, the Ministry of Environment told Parliament in December 2024. It is governed by the Plastic Waste Management Rules, 2016.

Electronic waste. Discarded computers, telephones and appliances containing lead, mercury and cadmium. The Central Pollution Control Board estimated 12,54,286 tonnes in 2023-24 and 13,97,955 tonnes in 2024-25, regulated by the E-Waste (Management) Rules, 2022.

Bio-medical waste. Waste from hospitals, clinics, laboratories and health camps, about 656 tonnes a day in 2020 according to the Ministry of Environment, governed by the Bio-Medical Waste Management Rules, 2016.

Hazardous industrial waste. Sludge, spent chemicals, slag and residues from industrial processes listed in the Schedules to the Hazardous and Other Wastes Rules, 2016, which also now govern used oil and non-ferrous metal scrap. The Bichhri case, Indian Council for Enviro-Legal Action v. Union of India, (1996) 3 SCC 212, shows what such sludge does to groundwater when left in the open.

The source of the local bodies' role

The Constitution. Article 243W allows the State Legislature to endow municipalities with responsibility for the Twelfth Schedule, whose item 6 is "public health, sanitation conservancy and solid waste management" and item 8 "protection of the environment". Article 243G does the same for panchayats in respect of the Eleventh Schedule, including health and sanitation, drinking water and the maintenance of community assets.

Municipal law. Municipal statutes make sanitation obligatory. Section 123 of the Madhya Pradesh Municipalities Act, 1961 requires a council to provide for cleansing streets and sewers, abating public nuisances and disposing of rubbish, including preparing compost from it. Section 42 of the Delhi Municipal Corporation Act, 1957 lists the scavenging, removal and disposal of filth and rubbish among the corporation's obligatory functions.

The rules. Rule 39 of the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2026 makes urban local bodies responsible for solid waste management in their jurisdiction, and rule 40 extends that responsibility to rural local bodies, a significant expansion beyond cities.

Local bodies and recycling

Segregated collection. The local body arranges collection of segregated waste and must transport it without mixing, and its concessionaires are bound by the same duty under rule 8. In Almitra H. Patel v. Union of India, (2000) 8 SCC 19, decided on 24 August 2000, the Supreme Court commended Bangalore's door to door collection scheme as a role model and observed that collectors must also educate people to segregate waste.

Material recovery. Entities sorting dry waste into recyclable and non-recyclable fractions at material recovery facilities must register with the local body under rule 9.

Local bodies and disposal

Landfill and legacy dumpsites. The local body disposes of residual waste and must remediate existing dumpsites, now part of its defined function under rule 4 of the 2026 Rules. It may not landfill non-recyclable waste of 1500 kilocalories per kilogram or more, which rule 13 reserves for energy recovery. The site for a sanitary landfill must be provided by the State urban or rural development department under rule 14.

Waste it must not take. Bio-medical and hazardous wastes are excluded from the municipal stream, and hospitals must not hand treated bio-medical waste to it. But waste batteries and non-ferrous scrap found in municipal waste must be handed to registered recyclers, and under rule 58 of the Hazardous and Other Wastes Rules local bodies must channel scrap of orphan products whose producers cannot be traced.

Contaminated land. Under the Environment Protection (Management of Contaminated Sites) Rules, 2025, the local body or District Administration identifies suspected contaminated sites, on its own information or a public complaint, and lists them on the portal for assessment by the State Board.

Builders and the dumpsite. A developer demolishing an old building cannot begin without a waste management plan the corporation approves, and its debris must go to a processing facility or the corporation's intermediate storage yard. Meanwhile the corporation must biomine or cap its old dumping ground, and send only the final residue to a sanitary landfill whose site the State department provides.

When residents complain. If collection stops, residents may invoke the corporation's statutory duty before the National Green Tribunal or the High Court, and the cases below show that lack of money will not be accepted as an answer.

The courts on the local bodies' duty

No plea of poverty. In Municipal Council, Ratlam v. Vardhichand, AIR 1980 SC 1622, (1980) 4 SCC 162, the Supreme Court held section 123 of the Madhya Pradesh Act mandatory and that a council constituted to preserve public health cannot plead financial inability.

Conclusion. India's wastes include very large and growing quantities of municipal solid waste, plastic and electronic waste, together with bio-medical, hazardous industrial, construction, battery, vehicle, faecal sludge, agricultural and legacy waste, each governed by its own rules. Local bodies derive their role from Articles 243W and 243G and the Twelfth and Eleventh Schedules, from municipal statutes, and from the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2026 and the plastic and construction waste rules. They treat waste by establishing and registering processing facilities and supervising bulk generators, recycle it through segregated collection, material recovery, plastic channels and construction debris approvals, and dispose of the residue in landfills while remediating dumpsites. Ratlam, Koolwal, Wadehra and Almitra Patel hold these duties mandatory and enforceable by citizens.