Greenpeace urges Nokia to press partner HCL to go green

New Delhi, Sept 5 (UNI) International environment NGO Greenpeace today urged Nokia, the market leader in mobile phones in India, to press its business partner HCL to phase out use of hazardous substances in its computers.

Greenpeace activists taking along a huge installation of e-waste with a message that read, Nokia: Ask HCL to go green, turned up at Nokia headquarters in Gurgaon today to draw its attention to the issue.

''We are here to urge Nokia to review its partnership with HCL, which has scored so poorly in its environmental commitment. HCL has failed to come out with a comprehensive time bound plan to clean its products of hazardous chemicals and substances'' said Pranav Sinha, Greenpeace toxics campaigner.

''As Nokia now leads the global race in electronics sector for clean products, logically it is in best position to tell this to its business partner, HCL, the IT market leader in India. In fact, Nokia is so far the only company that has made its products completely PVC-free,'' Sinha pointed out.

Greenpeace feels if HCL does not want to be seen as a major contributor to the e-waste crisis, it must not only take urgent steps to clean its products of all hazardous substances, but also lead India's IT brigade by setting practical and transparent systems of take back and responsible recycling all of its end of life products, with clear financial brand responsibility.

The information HCL has recently put in the public domain on its phase-out of hazardous chemicals is ''misleading'' and does not indicate what, if anything will change in the company's operations, the NGO said.

Greenpeace strongly advocates a comprehensive legislation based on the individual brand responsibility concept, where a producer is law-bound to take responsibility of the entire life cycle of its product.

Such legislation could address the mounting crisis of e-waste in India fixing financial responsibility for the end of life product on its producer.

UNI