Chromlum-and lead-mixed toxic waste from tanneries at Hazaribagh Is eating the Buriganga River away while the authorities are yet to come up with a permanent solution.

About 300 tanneries, big and small, operate in Hazaribagh. and almost all of them do not have any waste treatment plant.

The tanneries are dumping their effluents straight down the sewer into the river. A Department of Environment survey three years ago found that the river is not only highly polluted with the untreated waste, but also being encroached upon by Illegal constructions.

A long stretch of Buriganga from Monammadpur to Pagla al downstream has become septic where fish and aquatic animals are dying.

Chromium and lead among other chemicals are used to process the,raw hide at the tanneries.

A visit to the Hazaribagh down the embankment will snow anyone a thick light blue sludge flowing down the river.

There had proposals to shift the tanneries to Dhamrai. But the tanneries refused to move and more proposals to install waste treatment plants fell into deaf ears.

There had also been proposals to set up lagoons to store the wastes. But the tannery lobby is so powerful that they have thwarted all moves so far to streamline them.