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The lush tropical forest and rust-red hills of Lote, located on 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 not: it comes from the defunct Miteni plant in Vicenza, Italy. Miteni ceased operations in 2018 after one of the worst environmental scandals in the nation’s modern record: after decades of producing persistent PFAS compounds, the firm’s leadership was prosecuted for contaminating water resources in an area inhabited by 350,000 people. In June, previous company leaders were convicted at the Vicenza court of environmental damage and additional offenses and sentenced to jail, which they are expected to appeal against.

Understanding PFAS: Toxicity Levels and Exposure Routes

Nevertheless, the entire operational setup, its intellectual property and processes – all required components to produce forever chemicals – is now located at Lote Parshuram MIDC, a vast industrial enclave thousands of miles distant, wedged between villages and groves of trees. And the plant has just started to produce forever chemicals again.

A Toxic Legacy

Previously recognized for its expertise in creating methods for advanced chemicals, Miteni is now notorious for the toxic legacy it left behind. In 2011, scientists found exceptionally elevated levels of Pfas in the facility’s effluent. Hundreds of thousands of residents had been subjected through drinking water.

The most impacted were Miteni’s own workers. Ilario Ermetti, 69, who worked for decades in its specialty chemicals division, showed among the top levels of Pfas documented in human blood. “When the story came to light, I reviewed a catalog of health issues related to PFAS, and discovered I had them all,” states Ermetti.

High levels of PFAS in the bloodstream are associated with increased risk of malignancies, heart conditions, organ impairment, fertility issues and more. Ermetti is currently recovering from a recent surgical operation.

Public Apprehensions

Michela Piccoli, 51, a nurse and campaigner with Mamme No Pfas, began mobilizing after learning her children’s blood indicated high levels of persistent pollutants. When she found out that Miteni’s patents and machinery were being transferred to India, she was shocked.

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

Corporate Transition

Following Miteni’s insolvency, its holdings were bought in 2019 by Viva Lifesciences, a subsidiary of the domestic chemical corporation Laxmi Organic Industries – the only bidder in the open sale. By early 2023, all the equipment was being shipped en route to Mumbai. Meanwhile, Laxmi was promoting its recent purchase to shareholders. Records of investor gatherings show that Laxmi’s executives downplayed environmental concerns, with its president, Harshvardhan Goenka, declaring that Miteni was “doing everything legally in compliance with European standards”.

Goenka is one of the three men on the directorate of Laxmi Organic Italy, a company founded in 2021. Also included is Antonio Nardone, the final CEO of Miteni, who was found guilty of ecological offenses and false accounting at the recent court case and sentenced to six years and four months in prison. Per a ex-supervisor speaking on condition of anonymity, Nardone was taking business trips to India prior to the company went bankrupt.

While Laxmi bought Miteni’s properties in June 2019, the environmental assessment report for the construction of the factory in Lote shows that in March 2018 the company was already planning to commence manufacturing fluorinated compounds matching Miteni’s product list. Laxmi Organic Industries did not respond to inquiries.

Growth Plans

By 2021, Laxmi’s plan explicitly spelled out the goal to “acquire the customer base of Miteni” and emerge as a top player in the manufacturing of PFAS and specialty chemicals. Logistics data show that, to secure validation on the quality of the chemicals, in 2024 Laxmi began distributing samples to firms with previous commercial ties with Miteni, such as BASF, Chemours, DuPont and FMC.

From the beginning of 2025, Laxmi’s site in Lote Parshuram has been fully operational, producing chemicals that will be utilized for agrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, dyes, beauty products and other products.

Regulatory Context

Studies demonstrate that levels of forever chemicals in the ecosystem are worryingly elevated, particularly around manufacturing facilities. But even though international attention is growing, in India the matter is not on the political agenda yet.

“If we look at the regulations, [Pfas] is absent 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 performed research in different states. But these studies are restricted in range, and there are still only a handful.”

Local Impact

Parineeta Dandekar, head 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 established in 1986, “the income source of fisher folk communities in this region completely collapsed,” she said.

The chemical district is served by a shared effluent treatment facility that has been at the forefront of complaints.

“The local villages have consistently reported that it’s malfunctioning,” said Dandekar. “When there is no electricity, a frequent event in rural Maharashtra state, the facility cannot function and factories release polluted water directly into the streams.” Environmental authorities have sent multiple notices to the site in the past few years.

Global Implications

In the EU, the European Chemical Agency is examining a plan to prohibit the manufacture, importation and use of more than 10,000 forever chemicals. This attention may be driving the industry to the global south, according to Claudia Marcolungo, a professor of environmental law at the University of Padua. “I think that this matter should be examined, because the reality that Miteni’s operations, patents and machinery have been transferred to a nation like India should lead us to reflect, minimally, on the influence that these global corporations have to move in nations where there is evidently a race to the bottom in terms of ecological safeguards.”

Persistent Threats

Miteni has shut down, but the company’s toxic legacy lives on – at the polluted location in Vicenza, and in Lote. The medical effects linked to PFAS manufacturing are likely to affect populations that are already struggling with an hazardous setting for years to come.

“That region has seen enough environmental destruction by now,” says Dandekar. “If more dangerous companies move in, it’s always a risk.”