India | Stories from Ennore, where an oil spill only piled on to older, nastier disasters

Credit: Archanaa Seker and Dharmesh Shah

Credit: Archanaa Seker and Dharmesh Shah

A doctor alarmed by a stark increase in respiratory diseases.

A grandmother fretting over her grandson’s constant hospital visits.

Fishermen with skin lesions that the local hospital can’t heal.

Teenaged boys with itchy feet from trudging through sludge in order to play cricket.

A fisherman lamenting the loss of a river that was once beautiful, that once cleansed and provided a steady livelihood.

These are some of the stories from the port town of Ennore, on the outskirts of Chennai, told through images and words co-authored by Archanaa Seker of the Healthy Energy Initiative in India. Taken together, these personal accounts paint a grim picture of the toll of environmental pollution — stemming from coal-fired power plants and other industrial activities — on local communities. While a recent oil spill there made national headlines as a major environmental and public health emergency, it was just another day in the life of the residents of Ennore.

Read more in The Wire.

Tagged with , , ,
This post was written by
Comments are closed.