'We Don’t Need Electricity From Garbage in Hyderabad, We Need Air to Breathe'

Activists and residents say the landfill in the area leaks toxic leachate, contaminating the soil and groundwater.

Activists and residents say the landfill in Hyderabad’s Jawahar Nagar leaks toxic leachate, contaminating the soil and groundwater of nearby colonies.

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“Our health is in a disastrous condition, and nobody is taking responsibility. It feels like we are slowly walking towards our graves," says Jerome Raymond, a 35-year-old corporate employee who lives near a waste-to-electricity (WTE) plant in Jawahar Nagar in Telangana's Hyderabad.

For more than a decade, the people of Jawahar Nagar have been fighting a long and determined battle against the city’s dumping yard, a 300-plus-acre expanse of rotting legacy waste that has turned their homes into a health hazard. The landfill leaks toxic leachate that seeps into the soil, contaminating the groundwater and soil of nearby colonies. For years, this was already a story of slow violence and neglect.

But, as if that weren’t enough, the WTE plant, inaugurated in 2020 and located adjacent to the dump, has only worsened the disaster.

The plant, run by Re Sustainability (formerly Ramky Enviro Engineers) and Hyderabad MSW Energy Solutions, burns municipal solid waste to generate electricity. It was promoted as a “green” solution to cut down the landfill waste and produce power.

But when a joint civil society delegation, of which we were members, visited Jawahar Nagar in March 2025 as part of a citizen fact-finding team, what we found was not clean energy. It was a community slowly breathing in poison every second.

'Resident Around Jawahar Nagar Struggle For Survival'

Jerome, like several others in the locality, has been suffering from sinusitis for several years. Since the plant started operations, he says, his condition has worsened, and he now struggles with severe breathing difficulties and aggravated sinusitis. His six-month-old baby, too, is showing signs of breathing trouble.

Several people in the area around Jawahar Nagar, in Hyderabad, have been complaining of skin issues.

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Jerome’s family is also dealing with recurring skin infections and relies on strong medications such as Tezime and Ceczime. He believes that the water in the area is contaminated, and that the filters used in their homes no longer provide safe drinking water. "The leachate seeping into the ground could be a big problem,” he alleges.

Gyaneshwar, 58, lives in Lakshmi Nagar, two kilometres away from the WTE plant and the Jawahar Nagar dumping yard. A first-aid responder at a PSU, he has been suffering from persistent throat and breathing irritation. 

He says the situation has social as well as health impacts. “Relatives don’t visit us anymore. Even if we invite them to functions, they come and leave quickly,” he adds.

Skin acne is pretty common in people living around the dumping site in Hyderabad's Jawahar Nagar locality.

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Many neighbours are trying to sell their homes and move away. 

Gyaneshwar believes the crisis has persisted because of deep complicity. “The government pays the company for transporting garbage and buys electricity from them at high prices. None of this could have happened without the involvement of politicians, municipal officials, pollution control authorities, and the company. There’s a total lack of political will, maybe because there are arrangements between all the stakeholders,” he says.

There was an unbearable stench all around in the area to begin with, and even without visible smoke, the air carried the weight of years of decay. We saw children, men, women, and the elderly with red, inflamed skin and rashes that refused to heal.

Many spoke of constant itching, burning sensations, and infections that flare up every few days. Some had stopped letting children out because the irritation worsened after outdoor play. Others described recurring coughs, throat infections, and breathing difficulties that doctors could not explain.

Several residents mentioned kidney and pulmonary problems that have emerged over the past few years—slow, silent symptoms of long exposure to poisoned air and water.

Kiran and Sailaja, who live in MLR Colony, Dammaiguda, about five kilometres from the Jawahar Nagar WTE plant, say their lives have changed completely since they moved here a year ago. Both of them suffer from severe itching, breathing difficulties, and constant headaches. "It’s not just discomfort; it’s like living with pain that doesn’t go away," Sailaja says. 

Their 19-year-old asthmatic son is at high risk of asthma attacks. "We don’t let him go out to the terrace anymore. He stays inside the house with the AC on all the time," she says. "Those who go to work at least get some break from this air, but the elderly who stay home have no escape."

They keep their doors and windows shut all day, but the air still feels heavy. "There’s always a smell of decay like dead rats. Sometimes I feel a bitter taste in my throat," Sailaja adds.

'Toxic Findings, Official Silence'

In August this year, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) confirmed the community’s fears. In a report submitted to the National Green Tribunal (NGT), the CPCB found that the fly ash from the Jawahar Nagar WTE plant contained highly toxic cadmium and chromium way above the WHO's permissible limits. At 865.65 mg/kg, the cadmium is over 1,000 times the limit of 0.8 mg/kg for soil.

CPCB Report.pdf

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Instead of being sent to secure landfills or used in brick manufacturing as required, the fly ash was being dumped at the Jawahar Nagar site. 

The report also noted that the Telangana Pollution Control Board had monitored the plant only twice in five years, though rules require inspections every six months. Residents even allege that the plant operates mainly at night, releasing visible smoke and halting activity by day, a pattern that suggests pollution is being hidden from view. 

The board itself admitted its laboratory equipment was faulty, and that it relied on third-party labs for emission data, one reason why test results for dioxins and furans were suspiciously recorded as “0.0001", a reading too low to be true.The CPCB’s findings revealed what residents already knew from experience: the air, water, and soil around Jawahar Nagar are being poisoned in the name of clean energy. 

The same report also exposed that ash from another WTE plant at Dundigal run by the same company was being dumped at Jawahar Nagar, further compounding the pollution. 

Since each of the WTE incinerators can only handle around 1,300 to 1,500 metric tonnes of waste per day against the 8,000 metric tonnes of municipal solid waste generated by Hyderabad, the remaining just lies at the dumpsite to get dry, making the stench even more unbearable.

Policy Loophole and Public Betrayal

Activists also warn that the government’s move to reclassify WTE plants from 'Red' to 'Blue' category industries, despite their high pollution index, weakens oversight and endangers public health.

Earlier this year, the CPCB placed WTE plants under the newly created 'Blue' category, meant for ‘essential environmental services’, effectively moving them out of the 'Red' category that lists highly polluting industries.

Red-category industries are required to undergo more frequent inspections and disclose more data to the public. Blue-category plants face much lighter scrutiny and are even allowed self-monitoring. This recategorisation ignored a glaring fact that WTE plants have a pollution index of 97.6, the highest among all Blue industries. 

Then came another blow. On 3 October, the Ministry of Environment issued a draft notification exempting Common Municipal Solid Waste Management Facilities, including WTE plants, from mandatory environmental clearances.

This means new WTE projects would no longer need Environmental Impact Assessments or public hearings. For affected communities, this is the final silencing, a move that shuts the door on accountability and public participation. 

“WTE as a solution for waste management faces strong and widespread opposition globally and across India,” said Ruchit Asha Kamal from Climate Front India, who is also part of the national campaign opposing the reclassification of WTEs from the Red to Blue category.

“There are ongoing protests and court cases against existing WTE plants in Delhi, Gurugram, and elsewhere. For instance, more than 8,000 people in Chennai formed a human chain in protest. In Gujarat, a proposed plant was even withdrawn after sustained public opposition.” 

Ruchit Asha Kamal, Climate Front India

'A Call from Hyderabad'

What is happening in Jawahar Nagar is not an isolated incident. It is the outcome of policy shortcuts, regulatory negligence, and corporate impunity. The WTE plant was sold to Hyderabad as a technological fix to decades of waste mismanagement, but it has only deepened an existing environmental crisis. 

What makes this crisis more urgent is that the Telangana government and Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) are already planning to scale up the WTE model across the region. New WTE facilities have been proposed at Pyaranagar, Yacharam and Bibinagar, around Hyderabad and later across the state. 

“WTE projects merely convert solid waste into toxic air. Surprisingly, the government is subsidising this in various ways. Power purchase agreements involving these units have become money spinners for promoters. This is probably the best instance wherein polluters get paid for polluting the environment and life,” shared Donthi Narasimha Reddy, energy expert and a member of the advisory committee to the Telangana State Electricity Regulatory Commission.

What the Global North has rejected as toxic and unsustainable is now being repackaged and dumped on the Global South, turning places like Jawahar Nagar into profit sites for obsolete technologies.

The people of Jawahar Nagar did not create this crisis. However, their neighbourhood is treated as disposable, and their suffering is made invisible, paying the highest price for the city’s convenience. Most residents are from marginalised communities, socially and economically disadvantaged, and they are disproportionately affected by pollution and failed urban policies.  

Hyderabad cannot call itself a ‘global or smart’ city if it sacrifices its poorest and most vulnerable residents at the altar of convenience. “We just want clean air and water,” one woman told us softly, “Is that too much to ask?” Isn’t this her fundamental right under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution? 

It’s time the government listens to the people who have been saying this for years: WTE is not clean energy. It is a toxic promise and green illusion that’s now fully exposed.

The Quint has reached out to Re Sustainability Ltd via email and through its PR agency. The PR representative informed us that they would “attempt to obtain a response from the company”. However, they couldn't provide a response at the time of publishing this story.

The Quint has also contacted the Mayor and Commissioner of the GHMC through emails, calls, and messages. No response has been received on the Mayor’s official email. Her personal assistant stated that the Mayor is “currently occupied and will respond when possible”.

Calls, emails, and messages to the Commissioner remained unanswered. This story will be updated as and when responses are received.

(John Michael and Aparna Rajesh are with the Forum Against Economic and Environmental Injustice Towards Marginalised Communities.)

(All 'My Report' branded stories are submitted by citizen journalists to The Quint. Though The Quint inquires into the claims/allegations from all parties before publishing, the report and the views expressed above are the citizen journalist's own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)