Sterlite Industries (India) Ltd, a unit of the London-listed Vedanta Resources, can keep running its Tuticorin copper smelter unit for now. The Supreme Court overruled the Madras High Court’s earlier order to close the unit for violating environmental laws. The two-judge bench, comprising justices RV Raveendran and AK Patnaik, will now hear the case in the “third week of January.” For now, Sterlite can continue to operate the world’s ninth largest copper smelter in Tamil Nadu.
See http://www.tehelka.com/story_main48.asp?filename=Ws131210LEGAL.asp.
For background, see New study claims Vedanta smelter “endangers human health”:
A citizen’s study of soil, sediment and groundwater samples, close to Vedanta-Sterlite’s copper smelter in Tamil Nadu allegedly shows that the UK company is “endangering human health and environment and contaminating groundwater”. The company has just over a week to file its own affidavits to the Supreme Court, following a Madras High Court hearing in October which ordered closure of the smelter.
See http://www.minesandcommunities.org/article.php?a=10581.