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The lush green jungle and rust-red hills of Lote, situated along India’s west coast, give way to a modest rise where a factory looms against the sky.

This industrial unit is largely newly built, but its equipment is far from new: it originates from the defunct Miteni plant in Vicenza, Italy. Miteni ceased operations in 2018 following among the most severe environmental scandals in the nation’s modern record: after decades of producing persistent PFAS compounds, the company’s management was brought to trial for polluting water resources in an region home to 350,000 residents. In June, its former executives were convicted at the local tribunal of causing environmental pollution and other charges and given prison sentences, with appeals anticipated.

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

And yet, the entire operational setup, its intellectual property and methods – all required components to produce forever chemicals – is now located at Lote Parshuram MIDC, a large industrial zone almost 4,000 miles away, wedged between local communities and groves of trees. And the factory has recently begun to produce forever chemicals again.

An Environmental Burden

Once known for its expertise in creating methods for specialty compounds, Miteni is now infamous for the toxic legacy it left behind. In 2011, scientists found exceptionally elevated concentrations of Pfas in the plant’s wastewater. Numerous of inhabitants had been subjected through potable water.

The worst-affected were Miteni’s employees. Ilario Ermetti, 69, who was employed for years in its fluorinated chemical department, displayed among the top levels of PFAS documented in blood samples. “When the story came to light, I reviewed a list of medical conditions related to Pfas, and found out I had them all,” states Ermetti.

High levels of Pfas in the blood are linked to increased risk of malignancies, cardiovascular diseases, liver and kidney damage, reproductive disorders and more. Ermetti is currently recovering from a recent surgical operation.

Community Concerns

Michela Piccoli, 51, a healthcare worker and campaigner with Mothers Against PFAS, started organizing after learning her children’s blood showed elevated amounts of forever chemicals. When she learned that Miteni’s proprietary information and equipment were being sent to India, she was shocked.

“Being parents, as females, our anxiety has increased,” she said. “Since our kids are the children of all.”

Business Shift

After Miteni went bankrupt, its holdings were bought in 2019 by Viva Lifesciences, a branch of the Indian chemical company Laxmi Organic Industries – the only bidder in the public auction. By the start of 2023, all the equipment was travelling on freight ships en route to Mumbai. Meanwhile, Laxmi was boasting of its new acquisition to shareholders. Records of investor gatherings indicate that Laxmi’s executives downplayed ecological worries, with its president, Harshvardhan Goenka, stating 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 entity founded in 2021. Also included is Antonio Nardone, the last chief executive of Miteni, who was convicted of ecological offenses and false accounting at the June trial and given six years and four months in jail. According to a former mid-level manager requesting confidentiality, Nardone was traveling for work to India prior to the firm’s collapse.

Although Laxmi bought 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 intending to start producing fluorochemicals compatible with Miteni’s offerings. Laxmi Organic Industries declined to answer requests for comment.

Strategic Expansion

By 2021, Laxmi’s strategy explicitly spelled out the objective to “capture [the] market share of Miteni” and become a leader in the production of Pfas and fluorochemicals. Logistics data indicate that, to get approval on the quality of the chemicals, in 2024 Laxmi started sending out samples to companies with past business relationships with Miteni, including 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 agrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, dyes, cosmetics and other products.

Environmental Oversight

Investigations have shown that concentrations of forever chemicals in the ecosystem are alarmingly high, especially near manufacturing facilities. But although international attention is growing, in India the issue is not yet a policy priority.

“If we look at the regulations, [Pfas] is not present in those standards. It’s not recognised by the national authorities as of today,” said Rajneesh Gautam, an environmental chemist at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences. “Autonomous study teams across India have conducted studies in different states. But this work are restricted in range, and there are still very few of them.”

Regional Consequences

Parineeta Dandekar, coordinator of the regional environmental group, says the Lote Parshuram manufacturing zone “has a dismal environmental track record”. After it was established in 1986, “the livelihood of fisher folk communities in this region completely collapsed,” she said.

The chemical district is dependent on 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. “When there is no electricity, a common occurrence in rural Maharashtra state, the plant cannot function and industries release contaminated effluent directly into the streams.” Regulatory bodies have issued several warning letters to the plant in recent years.

International Ramifications

In the EU, the regulatory agency is reviewing a proposal to prohibit the manufacture, import and use of over ten thousand forever chemicals. This scrutiny may be driving the sector to the global south, per Claudia Marcolungo, a legal scholar at the academic institution. “I believe that this issue should be investigated, because the fact that Miteni’s production, patents and machinery have been relocated to a country like India should prompt consideration, minimally, on the influence that these global corporations have to move in nations where there is clearly a lowering of standards in terms of ecological safeguards.”

Persistent Threats

Miteni has closed down, but the company’s toxic legacy lives on – at the contaminated site in Vicenza, and in Lote. The medical effects linked to Pfas production are likely to affect populations that are already struggling with an hazardous setting for generations.

“That region has experienced sufficient environmental destruction already,” says Dandekar. “Should additional hazardous firms move in, it’s always a risk.”