Three contract workers died after allegedly inhaling toxic gas during maintenance work at Tata Electronics’ iPhone manufacturing facility in Hosur
The incident raises fresh concerns over worker safety and industrial safety protocols at Tata Electronics’ manufacturing operations, which are a critical part of Apple’s India iPhone supply chain
The incident took place while workers were cleaning a nano-filtration feed tank at the facility’s effluent treatment plant, operated by Nalco Water, a subsidiary of US-based Ecolab
Three contract workers died after allegedly inhaling toxic gases during maintenance work at Tata Electronics’ iPhone manufacturing unit in Tamil Nadu’s Hosur.
According to Reuters, the incident took place as workers were carrying out cleaning and maintenance work inside a nano-filtration feed tank, which was operated by US-based water treatment company Ecolabs’ subsidiary Nalco Water.
Confirming the development, Nalco Water said that the workers had been employed by one of its sub-contractors.
“We are deeply saddened by the tragic incident that resulted in the deaths of three workers engaged by a sub-contractor of Nalco Water… This incident occurred in a utility facility, operated by Nalco Water. We are working with the local authorities in the investigation of this incident,” said the company in a statement.
Sources told the news agency that the deaths, which took place late on Monday, will now be probed by Apple, Tata Electronics and local authorities. Another source reportedly added that an Apple team will visit the plant to assist in the investigation.
A separate report by Financial Express noted that Tata Electronics will also face an investigation by a joint team of officials from the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB) and the local Directorate of Industrial Safety and Health (DISH).
As per The New India Express, one of the workers fainted after looking inside the tank and inhaling gas. The other two workers then entered the tank to check on him and also collapsed subsequently due to asphyxiation.
All three workers were declared dead on arrival at the hospital, the report added. Citing official sources, the report added that there were no proper safety measures in place while handling the effluent treatment plant (ETP).
While preliminary investigation suggests toxic smoke inhalation, the police have reportedly said the final cause of death would be established after the post-portem.
This is not the first time that Tata’s iPhone manufacturing unit in Hosur has landed in the middle of a major controversy. In 2024, The latest incident comes nearly two years after the factory was engulfed by a massive firewhich caused injuries to eleven people and halted production.
Not just this, in June this year, the TNPCB had reportedly warned the Tata Hosur unit that the plant would be shut down over alleged wastewater contamination of wells in adjacent farmland.
Afterwards, Tata Electronics reportedly had said that an independent analysis showed compliance with regulatory norms. The conglomerate later also claimed that the pollution control board had dropped further action after the company confirmed that it had addressed all queries.
On top of this, in June itself, a ransomware group posted more than 2 Lakh files, including sensitive supplier information, stolen from the same Hosur iPhone assembly plant on the dark web.