Judgment in the "Meethotamulla Garbage Dump Case" (SC/FR 311/2015 and 318/2015), Sri Lanka

This case involves Fundamental Rights Applications filed by residents of Meethotamulla in the City of Colombo, Sri Lanka, who challenged the municipal council’s continuous dumping of massive quantities of municipal waste at Pothuvil Kumbura. The Petitioners applied to the Supreme Court seeking relief from the environmental pollution, public health hazards, and unbearable nuisance caused by the expanding garbage mound, which tragically collapsed in 2017, resulting in 40 deaths. 

In its landmark ruling, the Court defined "proper disposal” of garbage (municipal waste)” as the “timely, regular, comprehensive, lawful, and ethical discarding of the substance (garbage) at an appropriate location” so as to convert garbage to useful substances or sources of energy, through processes such as separation, cleaning and re-use, recycling, composting, incineration in an environmentally safe manner to generate energy, or sanitary landfilling of components that cannot be converted into useful substance. Consequently, the Court held that the respondents’ failure to manage the site safely constituted a gross violation of the Petitioners' right to equal protection under the law. Ultimately, the Court declared that the unlawful dumping of garbage between 2009 and 2017 amounted to a failure to enforce the provisions of the National Environmental Act, and infringed upon the fundamental rights of the people guaranteed under Article 12(1) of the Constitution.