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The dense green jungle and reddish-brown hills of Lote, located on India’s west coast, lead to a modest rise where a industrial facility stands under the open sky.

The factory is almost brand new, but its machinery is far from new: it originates from the former Miteni plant in Vicenza, Italy. Miteni closed down in 2018 following one of the worst ecological controversies in the country’s recent history: after years of manufacturing persistent PFAS compounds, the firm’s leadership was brought to trial for contaminating water sources in an area home to 350,000 people. In June, previous company leaders were convicted at the local tribunal of environmental damage and additional offenses and given prison sentences, which they are expected to appeal against.

Understanding PFAS: Toxicity Levels and Exposure Routes

Nevertheless, all of the company’s equipment, its patents and processes – everything needed to manufacture Pfas – is now here in 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.

A Toxic Legacy

Once known for its specialism in developing processes for specialty compounds, Miteni is now notorious for the toxic legacy it left behind. In 2011, scientists found exceptionally elevated levels of PFAS compounds in the facility’s effluent. Numerous of inhabitants had been subjected through potable water.

The most impacted were Miteni’s employees. Ilario Ermetti, 69, who was employed for years in its fluorinated chemical department, showed among the top levels of Pfas documented in blood samples. “After the facts emerged, I looked at a list of medical conditions related to PFAS, and discovered I had them all,” states Ermetti.

High levels of PFAS in the blood are linked to increased risk of cancer, heart conditions, liver and kidney damage, reproductive disorders and more. Ermetti is presently recuperating from a recent medical procedure.

Community Concerns

Michela Piccoli, 51, a nurse and campaigner with Mothers Against PFAS, started organizing after learning her offspring’s blood tests indicated elevated amounts of persistent pollutants. When she learned that Miteni’s patents and machinery were being sent to India, she was stunned.

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

Business Shift

Following Miteni’s insolvency, its assets were bought in 2019 by Viva Lifesciences, a branch of the Indian chemical company Laxmi Organic Industries – the only bidder in the open sale. By early 2023, all the equipment was travelling on freight ships en route to Mumbai. Meanwhile, Laxmi was promoting its new acquisition to investors. Transcripts of investor gatherings show that Laxmi’s management minimized environmental concerns, with its president, Harshvardhan Goenka, stating that Miteni was “doing everything legally according to EU regulations”.

Goenka is one of the three men on the directorate of Laxmi Organic Italy, a company founded in 2021. Another is Antonio Nardone, the last chief executive of Miteni, who was found guilty of ecological offenses and false accounting at the June trial and sentenced to six years and four months in prison. According to a ex-supervisor requesting confidentiality, Nardone was taking business trips to India months before the firm’s collapse.

Although Laxmi purchased Miteni’s assets in June 2019, the ecological review for the building of the factory in Lote shows that in March 2018 the company was already intending to commence manufacturing fluorochemicals compatible with Miteni’s offerings. Laxmi Organic Industries did not respond to inquiries.

Strategic Expansion

By 2021, Laxmi’s plan clearly outlined the objective to “acquire the customer base of Miteni” and emerge as a top player in the production of PFAS and specialty chemicals. Logistics data show that, to get approval on the standard of the compounds, in 2024 Laxmi began distributing samples to firms with past business relationships with Miteni, such as BASF, Chemours, DuPont and FMC.

From the beginning of 2025, Laxmi’s location in Lote Parshuram has been fully operational, manufacturing substances that will be utilized for agrochemicals, medicines, dyes, beauty products and other products.

Environmental Oversight

Investigations have shown that levels of persistent pollutants in the environment are alarmingly high, particularly around manufacturing facilities. But even though global focus is growing, in India the issue is not on the political agenda yet.

“If we look at the regulations, [Pfas] is absent in those standards. It’s unacknowledged by the Indian government currently,” said Rajneesh Gautam, an environmental chemist at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences. “Independent research groups across India have conducted studies in various regions. But these studies are restricted in range, and there are still very few of them.”

Regional Consequences

Parineeta Dandekar, coordinator of the South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers, and People, says the Lote Parshuram manufacturing zone “has a poor ecological history”. After it was established in 1986, “the income source of fisher folk communities in this region completely collapsed,” she said.

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

“Nearby communities have consistently reported that it’s not working properly,” said Dandekar. “When there is no electricity, a frequent event in the countryside, the facility fails to operate and industries discharge contaminated effluent straight into the waterways.” Regulatory bodies have sent several warning letters to the plant in the past few years.

Global Implications

In the EU, the regulatory agency is reviewing a proposal to prohibit the manufacture, importation and utilization of over ten thousand persistent compounds. This attention may be driving the sector to the developing nations, according to Claudia Marcolungo, a legal scholar at the academic institution. “I believe that this matter should be investigated, because the reality that Miteni’s production, patents and machinery have been relocated to a country like India should prompt consideration, at the very least, on the influence that these multinationals have to move in countries where there is evidently a race to the bottom in terms of environmental protection.”

Ongoing Risks

Miteni has shut down, but the company’s toxic legacy lives on – at the polluted location in Vicenza, and in Lote. The health impacts associated with PFAS manufacturing are expected to impact populations that are already struggling with an unsafe environment for years to come.

“The area has seen enough ecological damage by now,” says Dandekar. “If more dangerous companies move in, it’s perpetually concerning.”