During a hearing on Thursday, the Punjab and Haryana High Court directed the Chandigarh Municipal Corporation to respond to serious allegations made by advocate Amit Sharma regarding the Dadumajra garbage dump case. The division bench, led by Chief Justice Sheel Nagu and Justice Sumeet Goel, instructed the corporation to address claims that it had misled the court through false statements, fabricated reports and manipulated waste data.

Sharma, who had filed two applications in January and February 2025, argued that these misrepresentations were not isolated incidents but part of a systematic deception spanning nearly eight years. He referred to a National Green Tribunal (NGT) order from December 12, 2024, which stated that untreated leachate continued to flow, the treatment plant was non-functional and the legacy waste dump remained uncleared. The tribunal had also directed the Municipal Corporation to submit an affidavit on the status of the old waste dump, a response that had yet to be provided.

Sharma accused the Municipal Corporation of repeatedly falsifying critical data. In his January application, he alleged that the Corporation had falsely claimed the presence of a containment wall for leachate, even though the wall had collapsed a year earlier, leading to toxic waste spilling into residential areas. He also argued that the Corporation misled the court by asserting that a functional leachate treatment plant was in place.

In February, Sharma submitted additional evidence, claiming the Corporation had manipulated waste generation figures for years. He alleged that tenders worth crores were issued for waste removal, often based on inflated figures nearly double the reported waste.

For example, the Corporation told the National Green Tribunal (NGT) that 550 tonnes of waste were produced daily, and nearly all of it was processed. However, a separate submission to the court stated that only 200 tonnes per day were generated and fully processed.

There were several inconsistencies in the waste management data, including a tender for removing 13 lakh metric tonnes (LMT) of waste, despite an earlier report stating a total of only 7.67 LMT. Later, the Municipal Corporation claimed that 7.8 LMT had already been cleared.

In another case, officials initially denied the presence of a third dump site. Still, they later acknowledged it, first estimating its size at 1.25 LMT, then revising it to 1.40 LMT and eventually increasing the figure to 2.25 LMT within two days.

Sharma alleged that judicial scrutiny pressured the Municipal Corporation to change its integrated waste management plant projections. The plan was initially proposed for 25 years, later reduced to 15 years, and most recently shortened to 12 years.

Meanwhile, the Municipal Corporation’s lawyer, Gaurav Mohunta, argued that the petitioner was expanding the case scope beyond the original perjury notice. However, Sharma insisted that his separate applications clearly showed a consistent pattern of data manipulation and false reporting over the years.

After hearing the case, the High Court instructed the Municipal Corporation and the UT administration to submit their responses to the February application. Meanwhile, the January application was set aside for separate consideration.

The court scheduled the next hearing for March 24.