The judges have directed the “Kick out DOW, Save Pune Movement” to send the charge-sheet to DOW India and the State Government within a week.

Among the questions flagged by the audience, also to be discussed in the public inquiry included, the role of the police in handling protests and how would these objections be met if the 100-acre land is converted into a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) by the government.

Addressing the packed room at Shramik Bhavan, near PMC headquarters, Justice Suresh said that this was merely a forum to discuss issues that had come to light with chemical major DOW setting up its site near Chakan — a job that should be taken up by the government, the police functionaries, the MLAs and the MPs. “We are not a member of DOW Hatwa, Pune Vachwa. We are independent and will look at it with an outsider’s view. This is an exercise in democracy,” he said.

Suresh said while the commission did not have binding powers, it would facilitate the process of bringing information out in the public domain.

Earlier in the evidence presented before the commission, Neeraj Jain of Lokayat traced the DOW’s history in spreading chemical pollution during the Vietnam War — in “Agent Orange and Napalm bombs” which caused disabilities in more than five lakh children and the generations thereafter and its dubious record in continuing with products that had been deemed toxic.

Four witnesses from villages Shinde and Vasuli testified that the government officials had not been transparent about the identity of the company or with its history with the villagers.