Workers working in the agate industries are dying of silicosis in regular interval for last 40 years in Khambhat. Families are wiped out totally. But there is no respite from the death trap of economically impoverished people of this area.
The agate industry, is a household industry in the Khambhat region of Gujarat and its surrounding villages, employs over 30,000 people, many of them are women. The process of agate goes through mining, drying, frying, grinding, polishing Agate stones are made into beads by heating, chipping, grinding, drilling, and polishing them for use in jewelry and other decorative items. Mineral dust, especially silica produced during the stone grinding, causes pneumoconiosis tuberculosis, bronchitis, emplysema, pneumonitis, and other respiratory effects. Mining and cutting of stone produces silica dusts and prolonged exposure causes silicosis among workers. Silicosis (also known as Grinder's disease and Potter's rot) is a form of occupational lung disease caused by inhalation of crystalline silica dust, and is marked by inflammation and scarring in forms of nodular lesions in the upper lobes of the lungs.
