The reason is not far to seek: a number of industries on the banks of the Kolak and in Vapi allegedly discharge their untreated effluent directly into the river. Though the practice is years-old, the authorities have apparently been unable to stop it. But now, the villagers are speaking up on a platform provided by the Bharuch-based environmental organisation Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti.

Kolak fishermen gave vent to their woes before a team of the Indian People's Tribunal, led by retired Bombay High Court judge Hosbet Suresh, which is investigating the violation of human rights and environmental laws in Gujarat's golden corridor, stretching from Vapi to Nandesari.

``Basically, it is an effort to articulate the feelings of the silent majority and assert their Constitutional rights'', Shiraz Bulsara, social scientist and member of the IPT team told Express Newsline.

Assisting the tribunal are doctors, engineers, women's health specialists, social scientists and occupational health experts. Team members Dr Amar Jesani, Ms Nimita Bhatt, Dr K C Sahu, Dr Suhas Paranjpye, Mahrukh, Anand and Michael visited Kolak, Daman and Vapi for on-the-spot investigations, following which the PSS plans to prepare a detailed petition on the Golden Corridor's pollution problems.

At Kolak, villagers told the visiting team that they stopped fishing in the rivers about 10 years ago, when the impact of effluent began to be perceptible as far as 10 km from the shore. A village well has been declared off-limits as the water was found to be unfit for human consumption. The seven borewells that the villagers now depended on, too, tasted bad and gave off a foul smell.

According to village sarpanch Haribhai Tandel, ailments have increased over the past 15 years; more than 20 per cent of those who had died in these years had been victims of cancer, while at present nine people -- six of them unmarried girls -- were suffering from the disease.

The PSS's Michael backed up the statement by saying that studies had shown cancer was a long-term effect of industrial pollution.

The story of Daman Ganga is no different from that of the Kolak river, as the Vapi GIDC allegedly discharges untreated effluent into the river. At Varkund and Amarwadi, two villages near the town, skin diseases had been occurring with alarming frequency, Premabhai D Tandel, a fisherman, told the team.

A group of Vapi-based doctors also confirmed that cases of tuberculosis, asthma and respiratory problems had increased in the industrial town, considered to be the pollution capital of western India. Complaints of chronic fatigue, nasal problems, choking, throat pain and irregular sleep were related to pollution, they said.

Pollution-related problems, according to the environmental activists, were basically human rights problems, the activists said, adding that issues of toxic waste pollution had proved that the two issues were inseparable.