The Supreme Court-appointed expert committee has proposed exhausting the roughly 1,090 tonne of endosulfan stock lying unused in the country. The time-frame set is two years, and states have been given the right not to use it if they feel so.
Kerala has already banned endosulfan and has been seeking central assistance for the victims and the relatives of those who died in the wake of the aerial spraying of the chemical in Kasaragod, a process that was on for more than two decades till 2000. Production and import of endosulfan was banned in 2011 October and the stock has been lying at production units, mainly at the Hindustan Insecticides Ltd at Eloor, near Kochi. With stocks having piled up, the apex court had appointed the committee to look at ways to exhaust this.
The case is expected tocome up for hearing on November 27.