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The dense green jungle and reddish-brown elevations of Lote, located on India’s west coast, give way to a small hill where a factory looms against the sky.

The factory is almost brand new, but its machinery is not: it comes from the former Miteni plant in Vicenza, Italy. Miteni closed down in 2018 after among the most severe ecological controversies in the nation’s modern record: after decades of producing Pfas forever chemicals, the firm’s leadership was prosecuted for contaminating water resources in an area home to 350,000 residents. In June, its former executives were convicted at the Vicenza court of environmental damage and other charges and sentenced to jail, which they are expected to appeal against.

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

Nevertheless, the entire operational setup, its patents and processes – all required components to manufacture Pfas – is now here in Lote Parshuram MIDC, a vast industrial enclave almost 4,000 miles away, sandwiched among villages and wooded areas. And the factory has recently begun to produce forever chemicals again.

A Toxic Legacy

Once known for its specialism in creating methods for specialty compounds, Miteni is now infamous for the harmful aftermath it bequeathed. In 2011, scientists found extraordinarily high concentrations of PFAS compounds in the facility’s effluent. Hundreds of thousands of residents had been exposed 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 among the top levels of Pfas ever recorded in human blood. “After the facts emerged, I looked at a list of medical conditions associated with Pfas, and discovered I had them all,” states Ermetti.

High levels of PFAS in the blood are linked to increased risk of malignancies, cardiovascular diseases, organ impairment, fertility issues and additional ailments. Ermetti is presently recuperating from a recent medical procedure.

Public Apprehensions

Michela Piccoli, 51, a nurse and activist with Mamme No Pfas, started organizing after learning her offspring’s blood tests showed elevated amounts of persistent pollutants. When she learned that Miteni’s proprietary information and machinery were being sent to India, she was shocked.

“As mothers, as women, our concern has grown,” she said. “Since our kids are everyone’s children.”

Corporate Transition

Following Miteni’s insolvency, its holdings were bought in 2019 by Viva Lifesciences, a subsidiary of the Indian chemical company Laxmi Organic Industries – the only bidder in the open sale. By the start of 2023, the complete machinery was travelling on freight ships en route to Mumbai. Meanwhile, Laxmi was boasting of its recent purchase to investors. Records of investor gatherings indicate that Laxmi’s management downplayed ecological worries, with its president, Harshvardhan Goenka, declaring that Miteni was “operating lawfully in compliance with EU regulations”.

Goenka is one of the three men on the directorate of Laxmi Organic Italy, a company established in 2021. Another is Antonio Nardone, the final CEO 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. Per a ex-supervisor speaking on condition of anonymity, Nardone was taking business trips to India months before the company went bankrupt.

Although Laxmi purchased Miteni’s properties in June 2019, the ecological review for the building of the plant in Lote shows that in March 2018 the firm was already planning to commence manufacturing fluorochemicals compatible with Miteni’s offerings. Laxmi Organic Industries declined to answer inquiries.

Growth Plans

By 2021, Laxmi’s strategy explicitly spelled out the objective to “capture [the] market share of Miteni” and emerge as a top player in the manufacturing of PFAS and specialty chemicals. Logistics data indicate that, to get approval on the quality of the chemicals, in 2024 Laxmi started sending out test batches to companies with past business relationships with Miteni, including BASF, Chemours, DuPont and FMC.

Since early 2025, Laxmi’s location in Lote Parshuram has been completely active, producing chemicals that will be utilized for agrochemicals, medicines, dyes, cosmetics and additional goods.

Regulatory Context

Investigations demonstrate that levels of forever chemicals in the environment are worryingly elevated, especially near production sites. But even though international attention is growing, in India the matter is not yet a policy priority.

“If we look at the regulations, [Pfas] is absent in such guidelines. It’s unacknowledged by the national authorities currently,” said Rajneesh Gautam, an ecological scientist at the academic institution. “Autonomous study teams across India have conducted studies in various regions. But this work 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 set up in 1986, “the livelihood of fisher folk communities in this region totally deteriorated,” she said.

The chemical district is dependent on a centralised wastewater treatment plant that has been at the forefront of complaints.

“The local villages have always stated that it’s not working properly,” said Dandekar. “When there is no electricity, a frequent event in the countryside, the facility cannot function and industries discharge polluted water straight into the waterways.” Regulatory bodies have sent multiple notices to the site in the past few years.

Global Implications

In the EU, the European Chemical Agency is examining a plan to prohibit the manufacture, import and utilization of over ten thousand forever chemicals. This scrutiny may be pushing the industry to the developing nations, per Claudia Marcolungo, a legal scholar at the academic institution. “I think that this matter should be examined, because the fact that Miteni’s operations, intellectual assets and equipment have been relocated to a nation like India should prompt consideration, minimally, on the power that these multinationals have to relocate in nations where there is clearly a race to the bottom in terms of ecological safeguards.”

Ongoing Risks

Miteni has closed down, but the firm’s harmful impact continues – at the polluted location in Vicenza, and in Lote. The health impacts linked to Pfas production are expected to impact populations that are facing an hazardous setting for years to come.

“The area has seen enough ecological damage by now,” says Dandekar. “Should additional hazardous firms establish presence, it’s perpetually concerning.”