🔗 Share this article

The dense tropical forest and reddish-brown elevations of Lote, situated along India’s west coast, give way to a small hill where a factory looms under the open sky.

The factory is almost brand new, but its equipment is far from new: it originates from the former Miteni factory in Vicenza, Italy. Miteni closed down in 2018 after among the most severe ecological controversies in the country’s recent history: after decades of producing persistent PFAS compounds, the company’s management was brought to trial for polluting water resources in an area inhabited by 350,000 people. In June, previous company leaders were convicted at the local tribunal of environmental damage and additional offenses and given prison sentences, which they are expected to appeal against.

What are PFAS, how toxic are they and how do you become exposed?

And yet, all of the company’s equipment, its intellectual property and processes – all required components to manufacture Pfas – is now here in Lote Parshuram MIDC, a large industrial zone thousands of miles distant, sandwiched among local communities and wooded areas. And the factory has recently begun to produce forever chemicals again.

An Environmental Burden

Once known for its expertise in creating methods for advanced chemicals, Miteni is now notorious for the harmful aftermath it left behind. In 2011, researchers found exceptionally elevated levels of PFAS compounds in the plant’s wastewater. Hundreds of thousands of residents had been subjected through drinking water.

The most impacted were Miteni’s own workers. Ilario Ermetti, 69, who was employed for years in its fluorinated chemical department, showed one of the highest concentrations of Pfas documented in human blood. “After the facts emerged, I looked at a list of medical conditions associated with PFAS, and found out I had them all,” states Ermetti.

Elevated concentrations of Pfas in the bloodstream are associated with higher chances of cancer, heart conditions, organ impairment, reproductive disorders and additional ailments. Ermetti is presently recuperating from a recent medical procedure.

Public Apprehensions

Michela Piccoli, 51, a healthcare worker and campaigner with Mothers Against PFAS, started organizing after discovering her children’s blood showed high levels of persistent pollutants. When she learned that Miteni’s patents and equipment were being transferred to India, she was shocked.

“As mothers, as women, our concern has grown,” she said. “Because our children are the children of all.”

Business Shift

Following Miteni’s insolvency, its holdings were bought in 2019 by Viva Lifesciences, a subsidiary of the domestic chemical corporation Laxmi Organic Industries – the only bidder in the open sale. By early 2023, all the equipment was being shipped en route to Mumbai. At the same time, Laxmi was boasting of its recent purchase to shareholders. Records of shareholders’ meetings show that Laxmi’s executives minimized ecological worries, with its president, Harshvardhan Goenka, stating that Miteni was “operating lawfully in compliance with European standards”.

Goenka is one of the three men on the directorate of Laxmi Organic Italy, a entity founded in 2021. Another is Antonio Nardone, the last chief executive of Miteni, who was found guilty of ecological offenses and false accounting at the June trial and given six years and four months in prison. According to a former mid-level manager requesting confidentiality, Nardone was taking business trips to India prior to the company went bankrupt.

Although Laxmi bought Miteni’s assets in June 2019, the ecological review for the building of the plant in Lote shows that in March 2018 the company was already intending to start producing fluorinated compounds matching Miteni’s product list. Laxmi Organic Industries did not respond to requests for comment.

Strategic Expansion

By 2021, Laxmi’s plan explicitly spelled out the goal to “capture [the] market share of Miteni” and become a leader in the production of Pfas and fluorochemicals. Shipping records show that, to get approval on the standard of the chemicals, in 2024 Laxmi began distributing test batches to companies with previous commercial ties with Miteni, such as BASF, Chemours, DuPont and FMC.

From the beginning of 2025, Laxmi’s location in Lote Parshuram has been fully operational, producing chemicals that will be utilized for pesticides, pharmaceuticals, dyes, cosmetics and other products.

Regulatory Context

Studies demonstrate that levels of forever chemicals in the ecosystem are worryingly elevated, particularly around manufacturing facilities. But even though global focus is growing, in India the issue is not yet a policy priority.

“Examining the rules, [Pfas] is not present in such guidelines. It’s unacknowledged by the national authorities as of today,” said Rajneesh Gautam, an ecological scientist at the academic institution. “Autonomous study teams across India have conducted studies in different states. But these studies are restricted in range, and there are still very few of them.”

Local Impact

Parineeta Dandekar, coordinator of the South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers, and People, says the Lote Parshuram industrial district “has a dismal environmental track record”. After it was established in 1986, “the income source of fisher folk communities in this area completely collapsed,” she said.

The chemical district is served by a shared effluent treatment facility that has been at the forefront of complaints.

“The local villages have always stated that it’s not working properly,” said Dandekar. “During power outages, a common occurrence in rural Maharashtra state, the facility fails to operate and factories discharge polluted water straight into the streams.” Regulatory bodies have sent several warning letters to the plant in recent years.

International Ramifications

In the EU, the European Chemical Agency is examining a plan to prohibit the manufacture, importation and use of more than 10,000 forever chemicals. This scrutiny may be driving the sector to the developing nations, according to Claudia Marcolungo, a legal scholar at the University of Padua. “I believe that this issue should be investigated, because the fact that Miteni’s operations, patents and equipment have been relocated to a country like India should lead us to reflect, minimally, on the power that these global corporations have to move in countries where there is evidently a race to the bottom in terms of ecological safeguards.”

Ongoing Risks

Miteni has closed down, but the company’s toxic legacy lives on – at the contaminated site in Vicenza, and in Lote. The health impacts linked to PFAS manufacturing are likely to affect populations that are facing an unsafe environment for generations.

“That region has seen enough environmental destruction already,” says Dandekar. “If more dangerous companies move in, it’s perpetually concerning.”