INDIA'S RIVER OF DEATH.

The crusade against a polluting factory accused of breeding cancer in a duster of villages in south India received a bitter blow when 57-year-old K.A. Rahman died in January. The man who led the protest campaign against Grasim Industries from the company's birth in 1963 may well have fallen victim to the pollution from its factory on the banks of the Chaliyar River.

Rahman's name now appears in the Cancer Death Registerthat he himself introduced as Vazhakad village president three years ago. The data collection effort, not common in India, was prompted by high cancer incidence in the verdant villages around the factory in southern Kerala.

Inspired by their leader's death, environmentalists united in the Chaliyar Action Committee have formed a legal team to fight the plant in court. They are also supporting an indefinite hunger strike launched at Grasim's gates on January 26--India's Republic Day.

The activists allege that, despite court strictures and government orders, contaminated effluent from the plant--which produces pulp and rayon from bamboo and eucalyptus, using mercury in the process--is often emitted untreated into the Chaliyar River. Grasim, with annual sales of 20 billion rupees ($39 million), is owned by the industrial giant Birlas. The Committee says the factory draws 28 million gallons of free water daily and, in return, pours back eight million gallons of noxious effluent into the river, which is a lifeline for more than 200,000 people.

Along with polluted effluent, toxic sulfur dioxide smoke from the factory is alleged to have claimed several hundred lives with cancer, respiratory diseases, kidney and heart ailments. A recent health survey recorded 215 cancer deaths in Vazhakad alone. (The town had a population of 26,000 between 1990 and 1995.) Another study by government physicians put the cancer death rate at 29 percent in the valley. "This shows that we are now facing the cumulative impact of the pollution over the decades," says Dr. K.V. Hameed, who has rendered free medical service to affected people in 11 villages around Grasim Industries.

For its part, the factory denies everything. "Cancer death is a media baby" says Grasim President R.N. Saboo. "No one has proven scientifically any link between our factory and cancer."

The 30-year fight hasn't succeeded in dosing the factory, which provides badly needed jobs. "They have cashed in on the acute unemployment in Kerala" laments Professor K.T. Vijayamadhavan, who gave up his research career to fight what he calls an "environmental disaster" The factory continues to churn out toxic smoke, despite a scathing verdict from Kerala's high court in 1984, declaring that "human life should not be so cheap in this country" CONTACT: Chaliyar Action Committee, Pettah, Feroke, Kozhikode, Kerala 673-631, India/(011)91-495-401709.