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The lush green jungle and rust-red hills of Lote, located on India’s western shoreline, lead to a small hill where a industrial facility stands against the sky.

The factory is almost brand new, but its machinery is far from new: it originates from the defunct Miteni factory in Vicenza, Italy. Miteni closed down in 2018 after one of the worst ecological controversies in the nation’s modern record: after decades of producing Pfas forever chemicals, the firm’s leadership was brought to trial for polluting water sources in an region inhabited by 350,000 residents. In June, its former executives were convicted at the Vicenza court of environmental damage and additional offenses and sentenced to jail, 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 thousands of miles distant, sandwiched among villages and groves of trees. And the factory has recently begun to resume PFAS production.

An Environmental Burden

Once known for its expertise in developing processes for advanced chemicals, Miteni is now infamous for the harmful aftermath it bequeathed. In 2011, researchers found extraordinarily high concentrations of Pfas 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 reviewed a list of medical conditions related to PFAS, and found out I had them all,” says Ermetti.

High levels of Pfas in the blood are linked to higher chances of cancer, cardiovascular diseases, liver and kidney damage, reproductive disorders and more. Ermetti is currently recovering from a recent medical procedure.

Public Apprehensions

Michela Piccoli, 51, a nurse and campaigner with Mamme No Pfas, began mobilizing after discovering her offspring’s blood tests indicated elevated amounts of forever chemicals. When she found out that Miteni’s patents and equipment were being transferred to India, she was shocked.

“As mothers, as women, our anxiety has increased,” she said. “Because our children are the children of all.”

Corporate Transition

After Miteni went bankrupt, its holdings were acquired in 2019 by Viva Lifesciences, a branch of the Indian chemical company Laxmi Organic Industries – the sole participant in the public auction. By the start of 2023, all the equipment was being shipped en route to Mumbai. Meanwhile, Laxmi was boasting of its new acquisition to shareholders. Records of shareholders’ meetings indicate that Laxmi’s management downplayed ecological worries, with its president, Harshvardhan Goenka, stating that Miteni was “doing everything legally according to EU regulations”.

Goenka is a member on the directorate of Laxmi Organic the Italian branch, a company established in 2021. Also included is Antonio Nardone, the final CEO of Miteni, who was found guilty of environmental pollution and false accounting at the June trial and given six years and four months in prison. According to a ex-supervisor speaking on condition of anonymity, Nardone was traveling for work to India prior to the company went bankrupt.

Although Laxmi bought Miteni’s assets in June 2019, the environmental assessment report for the building of the factory in Lote shows that in March 2018 the firm was already planning to commence manufacturing fluorochemicals matching Miteni’s product list. Laxmi Organic Industries did not respond to inquiries.

Strategic Expansion

By 2021, Laxmi’s strategy explicitly spelled out the goal to “capture [the] market share of Miteni” and become a leader in the production of Pfas and specialty chemicals. Logistics data show that, to get approval on the quality of the chemicals, in 2024 Laxmi began distributing samples to companies with previous commercial ties with Miteni, including BASF, Chemours, DuPont and FMC.

Since early 2025, Laxmi’s site in Lote Parshuram has been fully operational, manufacturing substances that will be used in agrochemicals, medicines, colorants, beauty products and other products.

Environmental Oversight

Investigations demonstrate that levels of forever chemicals in the ecosystem are worryingly elevated, particularly around production sites. But although global focus is growing, in India the issue is not yet a policy priority.

“If we look at the regulations, [Pfas] is absent in those standards. It’s not recognised by the Indian government currently,” said Rajneesh Gautam, an environmental chemist at the academic institution. “Independent research groups across India have performed research in different states. But this work are limited in scope, and there are still only a handful.”

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 area totally deteriorated,” she said.

The industrial area is served by a centralised wastewater treatment plant that has been frequently criticized.

“Nearby communities have consistently reported that it’s not working properly,” said Dandekar. “During power outages, a common occurrence in rural Maharashtra state, the facility fails to operate and factories discharge polluted water directly into the streams.” Environmental authorities have sent multiple notices to the site in the past few years.

International Ramifications

In the EU, the European Chemical Agency is examining a proposal to prohibit the manufacture, import and use of more than 10,000 persistent compounds. This scrutiny may be pushing the sector to the developing nations, per Claudia Marcolungo, a professor of environmental law at the University of Padua. “I believe that this matter should be investigated, because the reality that Miteni’s operations, intellectual assets 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 nations where there is clearly a race to the bottom in terms of ecological safeguards.”

Ongoing Risks

Miteni has shut down, but the company’s toxic legacy continues – at the contaminated site in Vicenza, and in Lote. The health impacts associated with Pfas production are expected to impact communities that are facing an unsafe environment for years to come.

“That region has seen enough ecological damage already,” says Dandekar. “Should additional hazardous firms move in, it’s always a risk.”