KOCHI: The Kerala high court on Tuesday held that the inclusion of non-woven plastic carry bags in the list of banned single-use plastic items by the state government without regard to the grams per square metre (GSM) standards, specified in the central rules, is highly illegal and arbitrary.
Holding that such a ban violates the provisions of the Plastic Waste Management Rules, 2016, justice N Nagaresh set aside two government orders (of November 17th and 27th of 2019) and a circular (of January 27, 2020) issued by Kerala State Pollution Control Board (PCB) to the extent they ban the manufacture, transportation, sale, and use of non-woven bags of 60 GSM and above.
