India has found microplastics everywhere. So why are we still unsure how to regulate them?
Studies across India have detected microplastics in rivers, wetlands, packaged food, salt, sugar, and air, indicating widespread contamination well beyond visible plastic litter.
A 2022 study found microplastics in every water sample tested along the Ganga between Rishikesh and Farakka, with Kanpur recording the highest levels; further 2025 research across 11 Ganga-basin cities confirmed continued contamination.
Testing of India's Bhoj Wetland (a Ramsar-designated site in Bhopal) found 8-19 microplastic particles per litre depending on season.
A 2024 study found microplastics in all tested salt and sugar brands sold in India, with iodised packaged salt showing the highest concentrations.
Despite this spread of evidence, India's existing plastic-waste regulatory framework does not directly address microplastics generated during product use, such as those shed by tyres and synthetic textiles, exposing a regulatory gap that experts want closed through standardised testing and cross-agency coordination.
Microplastics: Definition and Sources
Microplastics are plastic particles or fibres smaller than 5 millimetres in size. They are classified as primary microplastics (manufactured at that size, e.g., microbeads in cosmetics or synthetic microfibers shed by clothing) or secondary microplastics (formed by the fragmentation of larger plastic items through weathering, UV exposure, and abrasion).
The reported contamination in Indian salt, sugar, rivers, and air illustrates exactly this use-phase versus waste-phase distinction, which is the core reason existing law under-regulates the problem.
Plastic Waste Management Rules, 2016 (as amended) and the Regulatory Gap
The Plastic Waste Management Rules, 2016, notified by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, is India's principal legal instrument governing plastic waste, covering Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR), a phased ban on identified single-use plastic items, and minimum thickness standards for carry bags.
Key Details
- The Plastic Waste Management (Amendment) Rules, 2024 strengthened provisions on biodegradable plastics — defining them as plastics that break down through biological processes without leaving microplastics or toxic residues — but this addresses end products, not the microplastics shed during the use phase of conventional items like tyres or textiles.
- The Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), a statutory body under the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1974 and the Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1981, administers certification (e.g., for compostable/biodegradable plastic producers) and monitors compliance with the Plastic Waste Management Rules.
- The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, governs contaminant limits in food but currently has no standardised threshold specifically for microplastics in food products such as salt and sugar.
Experts quoted in the report point exactly to this fragmentation — CPCB governs waste and industrial pollution, FSSAI governs food safety, and no single agency owns use-phase microplastic generation — as the reason India lacks standardised testing protocols and enforceable microplastic limits.
International Framework: Basel Convention and the Global Plastics Treaty
India is a party to the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal (1989, India ratified 1992), which was amended in 2019 to bring plastic waste under its transboundary movement controls.
Key Details
- The 2019 Basel Convention Plastic Waste Amendments (adopted at COP-14) added plastic waste to Annexes II, VIII, and IX, requiring prior informed consent for cross-border shipments of contaminated or non-recyclable plastic waste; the amendments entered into force in January 2021.
- Separately, UN Environment Assembly member states (including India) are negotiating a legally binding Global Plastics Treaty, mandated to address the "full lifecycle" of plastics from production to disposal, under an Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC) process; a final treaty text has not yet been adopted.
- Neither instrument currently sets binding, product-specific microplastic emission limits, leaving that gap to domestic regulation.
The article's core argument, that domestic rules lag scientific detection, mirrors the unresolved state of the global treaty process; both are cited as reasons India needs source-based, lifecycle-oriented microplastic regulation rather than only end-of-pipe waste rules.
- 2022 Ganga study: microplastics detected in every water sample between Rishikesh and Farakka; highest levels at Kanpur.
- Bhoj Wetland (Ramsar site, Bhopal): 8-19 microplastic particles per litre, varying by season.
- 2024 testing: microplastics found in all 10 salt brands and 5 sugar brands examined, with iodised packaged salt highest.
- Basel Convention Plastic Waste Amendments: adopted 2019 (COP-14), in force January 2021; India ratified the original Basel Convention in 1992.
- Plastic Waste Management Rules notified 2016 under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986; latest amendment in 2024 targets biodegradable-plastic standards.