Dealing With the Telangana Pollution Control Board

The Telangana State Pollution Control Board grants and refuses consents, inspects units, takes samples, issues show-cause notices and can order closure or the cutting of power and water to a polluting unit. If you run a unit and have a notice, you usually have a short window to reply with documents, and a 30-day limit to appeal a direction to the NGT's Southern Zone Bench in Chennai. If you are a resident, the board is your first stop for a written complaint, and the NGT is the backstop when the board does nothing.

This page is for two kinds of readers: owners and managers of units in Telangana who are dealing with the board over consent, inspections, notices or closure, and residents of Hyderabad and the districts who want the board to act against a polluter. It explains what the board can and cannot do, how a file actually moves, and where you go when the board's decision is wrong. For the wider picture of environmental cases in the state, see our page on environmental lawyers for Telangana.

The board was set up when Telangana was formed in 2014; before that the region was regulated by the Andhra Pradesh board, so some older units still hold papers issued in that name. After the state code changed from TS to TG, the board's short form also changed from TSPCB to TGPCB. The law it applies did not change.

The essentials

We have a notice from the Telangana pollution control board. What should we do first?

Read the notice for three things: the section it is issued under, the date it was received, and the deadline. A notice under section 33A of the Water Act or section 31A of the Air Act is a step towards closure or disconnection. A notice about consent conditions or a missed renewal is usually less severe, though it can lead to the same place if ignored. The section decides your remedy, so it matters more than the tone of the letter.

Then collect the facts before writing anything: the current consent order, the last few months of ETP and stack monitoring records, the hazardous waste manifests, any third-party lab reports, and photographs of the plant as it stands today. Officers respond better to a point-by-point reply with an annexure for each allegation than to a long letter about the unit's history.

Ask for a personal hearing in the reply. If the notice relies on a sample or inspection report you have not seen, ask for a copy in writing. That request, made on record, protects you later if the matter reaches the NGT.

What the Telangana board actually controls

The board is a State Board under the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act 1974 and the Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act 1981. Under these Acts it grants consent to establish (CTE) and consent to operate (CTO), lays down conditions on discharge and emissions, inspects premises, takes samples and gives directions, including closure and the stopping of electricity or water. It also acts under rules made under the Environment (Protection) Act 1986, such as the Hazardous Waste Rules 2016, the Bio-Medical Waste Rules 2016, the Plastic Waste Management Rules and the Battery and E-Waste Rules of 2022.

What the board does not control is just as useful to know. It does not decide land use or building permissions; those sit with the municipal corporation, HMDA or the local body. It does not grant environmental clearance for large projects; that is the SEIAA or the Central Government under the EIA Notification 2006. Groundwater permissions sit with the groundwater authority. A resident who complains to the board about a building's height, or a unit that asks the board to fix a land-use problem, wastes weeks.

Two legal changes affect how the board punishes. The Jan Vishwas Act 2023 turned many offences under the Air Act and the EP Act into monetary penalties decided by an adjudicating officer. The 2024 amendment to the Water Act does the same for water offences, but it applies in a state only once that state adopts it, so check whether Telangana has done so before relying on it.

Which authority hears what in Telangana

Most delay comes from going to the wrong forum. This table sets out the usual route for each kind of problem.

Consent to establish, consent to operate, renewal and expansion

Every unit that discharges effluent or emits into the air needs consent, unless it falls in the white category, which is exempt. The CPCB classifies industries as red, orange, green and white by pollution potential, and the board applies that list along with its own guidance. Consent to establish comes before construction; consent to operate comes before production. Our page on consent to operate explains the general process, and the guide on CTE versus CTO explains the difference in plain words.

In Telangana, applications go through the board's online consent system. The common reasons for delay are boring ones: a site plan that does not match the land documents, a capacity figure that differs from the CTE, missing ETP design details, or a hazardous waste quantity that looks too low for the product mix. Officers compare figures across your own papers, and a mismatch stops the file.

Expansion and product-mix changes are where pharma and chemical units most often get into trouble. Adding a new product or increasing capacity usually needs fresh consent, and for many bulk drug projects it may also need an EC amendment. Producing first and applying later is treated as operating without consent. If you are planning a change, read our page on consent for expansion before you order the reactors.

Consent rules have changed several times in 2024 and 2025, including new exemptions and changes in when CTE is needed. Check the current notification and the board's latest guidance for your category before assuming the old rule still holds.

Telangana's industrial clusters and what the board looks for

The largest concentration of polluting industry is the bulk drug and chemical belt around Hyderabad, especially the industrial areas of Sangareddy and Medchal districts such as Patancheru, Bollaram, Pashamylaram and Jeedimetla. Patancheru and Bollaram have figured in CPCB's assessments of polluted industrial clusters. For these units the board's attention falls on effluent quality, solvent handling and recovery, odour, hazardous waste storage and the flow of waste to treatment and disposal facilities.

Outside Hyderabad, the Godavari belt has coal mining and coal-based power, with fly ash and ash pond management as recurring issues. Granite quarrying and stone crushing are common in several districts, and cement plants operate in the southern districts. Each brings its own problems: dust and blasting near villages, slurry and waste rock, and trucks on village roads.

Then there are the lakes. Hyderabad's tanks and the Musi river receive sewage and sometimes industrial discharge, and encroachment on lake beds is a constant complaint. The board deals with discharge; encroachment is mainly for the revenue, irrigation and municipal authorities, and the NGT where a lake is being destroyed.

Common Telangana situations and the usual board response

How a unit should handle a Telangana board notice

This is the sequence we follow when a unit brings us a show-cause notice or a direction.

If the problem is a closure order already in force, our page on replying to a closure notice goes into the revocation process in more detail.

Inspections, samples and why the sampling record matters

Board officers can enter and inspect a unit and take samples of effluent, emissions, soil or waste. The way a sample is taken matters. For effluent, the law sets out a procedure for collecting the sample, sealing it and offering the occupier a share. If the unit's representative was present, signed the sampling sheet and was offered a part of the sample, it becomes very hard to challenge the result later.

Many units make the mistake of refusing to sign the sampling form, thinking it helps. It rarely does. A better approach is to sign with a note of anything wrong (wrong point of collection, ETP under maintenance, rain dilution), keep your share of the sample and get it tested at a recognised laboratory. A parallel result, taken at the same moment, is the strongest material you can have.

When Advocate B.K. Singh looks at a Telangana closure direction for a chemical or pharma unit, he starts with the sampling record: where the sample was drawn, whether the unit was offered its share, how long it took to reach the lab, and whether the parameters that failed are in the unit's consent at all. A failure on a parameter the consent does not even list is a very different case from a failure on the main ones.

Closure, disconnection and environmental compensation

Under section 33A of the Water Act, section 31A of the Air Act and section 5 of the EP Act, the board can direct closure, prohibit an activity, or direct the power utility and water supplier to stop supply. In Telangana, as elsewhere, a show-cause notice normally comes first, but in serious cases the board can act quickly. When power is cut, our page on disconnection by the pollution board explains what to do.

Environmental compensation is often added to a closure or revocation order. The board uses a formula, based on CPCB methodology, that multiplies factors such as a pollution index for the industry category, days of violation, a scale factor and a location factor. Units often accept the figure because they want to restart. You should at least check the number of days counted, the category used and the starting date. Our page on environmental compensation demands covers how these figures are tested.

Paying compensation does not regularise operation without consent, and it does not stop residents from claiming their own losses under section 15 of the NGT Act.

The provisions you will see in Telangana board papers

Complaining to the Telangana board as a resident

A good complaint is short and specific. Name the unit, give its location (survey number or plot number if you know it), describe what you see, smell or hear, give dates and times, and attach photographs and videos with timestamps. Say how many households are affected. Ask for an inspection, sampling and action under the Water or Air Act. Send it by email and registered post so there is a record, and keep the acknowledgement.

Colonies near the industrial belts often complain of strong chemical smells late at night, when inspections are rare. Keep an odour diary with times and wind direction, and get several households to sign it. An RTI asking for the unit's consent order and the last inspection report tells you whether the unit has permission at all. Our page on pollution complaints sets out how to build this record.

Advocate B.K. Singh's usual advice to residents' associations is to give the board a fair chance and a clear deadline in writing before going to the NGT. The tribunal asks what you did first, and a file showing two or three dated complaints, an RTI reply and no action is far stronger than a petition built on news reports.

What we do at each stage

• Before applying. We check the category, siting and documents for a CTE or CTO application, so the file does not stop on a mismatch.
• On a show-cause notice. We read the notice against the consent, obtain the board's inspection and sample material, and draft a point-by-point reply with annexures.
• At the hearing. We prepare the plant manager and attend with you, so technical questions get direct answers.
• After closure. We prepare the revocation application and negotiate the conditions and any bank guarantee.
• On appeal. We file appeals before the state appellate authority or the NGT Southern Zone Bench in Chennai, and writ petitions in the Telangana High Court where the problem is outside the NGT's reach.
• For residents. We draft complaints and RTIs, and file applications before the NGT when the board does not act.

Mistakes units and residents make with the Telangana board

Units often treat a notice as a negotiation rather than a legal document. They reply late, or with promises instead of proof. They let a consent lapse and keep running, change products without fresh consent, and leave the conditions to a consultant nobody checks. Each of these is easy to avoid and expensive to repair.

Residents make different mistakes. They complain only by phone, so there is no record. They send one complaint to the wrong authority and wait months. They go to the NGT after the six-month limit has run, or without asking the board first. And some exaggerate, which a joint committee inspection quickly exposes.

Documents to keep ready

Other state boards and related pages

If your group also has units in other states, the boards there follow the same Acts but differ in practice. See our pages on dealing with the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board and the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board, which also fall under the Chennai bench. For a direction already issued, see our page on appealing a pollution board order. Businesses with offices in Hyderabad can also read our page for an environmental lawyer in Hyderabad.