THE SUPREME Court has slapped Rs one lakh fine on the owner of a polluting industry in Delhi and sentenced him to one-week imprisonment for his failure to close the unit as per the Court's order.

bench comprising Justice Y. K. Sabharwal and Justice H.K. Sema found Ashok Kumar Chhabra, owner of a hot mix plant, guilty of the contempt of the court for disobeying its order to shut down the unit.

It said the punishment would send a strong signal to the people who continued to operate their polluting units.

In 1996, the SC, while dealing with a petition, had asked the owners of 43 hot mix plants in Delhi to close down their units.

In its effort to check pollution, the Court had in 1998 also asked the Centre and the Delhi government to convert the 10,000 diesel buses into CNG mode. Besides, it slapped Rs ten lakh fine on Span Motels Private Ltd. for damaging the environment by changing the course of river Beas in Kullu in Himachal Pradesh.