In contempt of its own order

The SUpreme Court passed orders on the definition of the Aravallis on November 20, 2025, stating that landforms above 100 m in the range will be considered as Aravalli hills. This was done for the purpose of enabling mining by preparing a so-called Management Plan for Sustainable Mining (MSMP) in the Aravalli’s on the lines of Saranda Mining Plan.

While this definition of the Aravallis is dangerous and untenable, it also is violative of a previous order of the same court in another case—WP 1164/23 (Ashok Sharma case), dated March 4, 2025.

The WP 1164/23 was filed by a group of former bureaucrats and environmental activists challenging the Forest (Conservation) Amendment Act 2023. The Supreme Court, on two occasions in the case—February 19, 2024 and March 4, 2025—directed that all states and Union Territories (UTs) under the leadership of the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) needed to identify all categories of forests, as per the Godavarman order of WP 202/96. The order of the chief justice of India, on March 4, 2025, went a step further and directed that not only the forests needed to be identified but also mapped as per Geographic Information System (GIS) in obedience to the Lafarge order which was passed in 2011 and had still not been complied by the states/UT’s, or facilitated by the Forest Survey of India (FSI) or MoEFCC. The court directed that the compliance should be reported within six months, that is by September 4, 2025, else the chief secretaries would be held responsible for contempt of court.

The Godavarman order of 1996 had directed identification of forest lands as per government records and dictionary meaning, irrespective of ownership. These forests included notified forests; unclassed forests; deemed forests; Sec 4 & 5 notified Punjab Land Preservation Act (PLPA), 1900, lands in Haryana and Rajasthan; and “gair mumkin pahar” in Haryana, Rajasthan and Gujarat, which occur in the Aravallis. “Gair mumkin pahar” refers to land classified in Indian revenue records, particularly in Haryana and Rajasthan, as uncultivable hills or mountains unsuitable for agriculture due to rocky, steep terrain and identified as forests. The Godavarman order also included identification of all degraded forests which are aplenty in the Aravallis.

While no scientific surveys have been done, it is estimated that forest cover hovers between 25,000 sq km and 27,000 sq km across the 60,000 sq km landscape in the Aravallis, with heavy degradation of forests in the range. It is estimated that the range lost 5,772.7 sq km of forest cover, equating to roughly 32 per cent of its green areas. This erosion stems from activities like mining and conversion to settlements. However, exact data on forests, its degradation and parts lost to illegal mining is not known since the range has not been mapped.

Despite the apex court orders in the Ashok Sharma case, most states have neither identified, demarcated or GIS-mapped these forests and wildlife corridors, both of which also exist below the 100 metre height of Aravallis and need to be identified and protected. This includes Rajasthan and Haryana—the two main states having the Aravalli ranges. This is understood by the affidavit filed by MoEFCC regarding identification and mapping of forests which was filed on October 3, 2025 in the Ashok Sharma case. Both Haryana and Rajasthan have reported only partial work of identification of its Reserved Forests (RF); Haryana has partly digitised its RFs and Rajasthan has not done it at all. Haryana has partly identified its unclassed forests while Rajasthan has not done it at all. Haryana and Rajasthan have also not identified, demarcated or mapped their Section 4 & 5 notified PLPA lands or “gair mumkin pahars”. They have not identified their degraded forests also. None of the states have mapped their wildlife corridors and eco-sensitive zones.

Further, Haryana is using 40 per cent canopy cover and five hectare forest patches to identify forests, which is ridiculous considering Haryana is an arid zone and forests beyond 40 per cent canopy are rare, and leave out degraded forests which need to be identified as per Godavarman order and specification of forests as per government records. The state has not even followed the FSI classification of forests—at least 1 ha land with 10 per cent canopy—for identification of unclassed forests and forest-like areas, PLPA lands and “gair mumkin pahars”. Canopy cover is not the only criterion but mention of such areas in any revenue and forest records would qualify these areas as forests. Identification of forests and their demarcation and GIS mapping are essential as a first step to obeying the apex court orders in the Ashok Sharma case before mining or any such activity can be envisaged in the Aravallis.

In a shocking and incomprehensible order, the Supreme Court, on November 20, 2025 defined Aravallis as 100-plus metres height and directed to prepare a MPSM for the range, in contravention of its own orders of March 4, 2025 in the Ashok Sharma case. It is untenable that Aravallis can be defined on the basis of height forgetting that its forests, Section 4 & 5 notified PLPA lands and “gair mumkin pahars” are to be identified and protected first. If an exercise defining Aravallis by a height of 100-plus meter is undertaken, our forests in the Aravallis will be subsumed by this definition and will be on the block for mining rather than identified, demarcated, protected and regenerated.

The Supreme Court ought to have first got implemented its orders of identifying all categories of forests identified and protected rather than facilitate an unwarranted mining plan ready to gouge out large tracts of the Aravallis which include forests and wildlife corridors that are bound to be protected by the Supreme Court orders as well as the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980 and its amendment. We are in a situation where the court is enabling violation of its own orders as well as forest laws. Such violative orders will destroy forests by the court itself, ensure that diversion of forest lands will not comply with the provisions of the Forest (Conservation) Act and will not obtain equivalent compensatory afforestation of non-forest lands, lands and funds in lieu of diversions while also losing out on net present value (NPV) funds which are mandatory pre-requisites for forest land diversions.

Further, as per the amended rules of the Forest Conservation (Amendment) Act, 2023, in August 2025, all diversion involving minerals of the Seventh Schedule, as specified by the Union Ministry of Mines, can be considered Forest (Conservation) Act-compliant if three-parts degraded forestland is exchanged in lieu of one-part forest to be mined. Most of the minerals and elements for mining proposed by the Supreme Court order of November 20, 2025 come under this category. This is a triple whammy! (Take away one-part lush forest for mining and notionally give back three-parts degraded forests—lands that were already with the government). This is another contravention of the Ashok Sharma Supreme Court order dated February 3, 2025, which stated. “We make it clear that until further orders, no steps will be taken by the Union of India or any of the States, which will lead to reduction of the forest land unless a compensatory land is provided either by the State Government or the Union of India for the purpose of afforestation.”

Achieving the forest policy target to have 33 per cent forest cover in the plains and 66 per cent forest cover in the hills is a pipe dream under the 100-plus metres Aravalli definition. So now we are in a fix! Which Supreme Court orders need to be followed? The order to identify and protect our forests or the one which destroys the forests by defining Aravallis as 100-plus metres? Knowing our agencies, the order favoured will be the one that aids mining, one which defines Aravallis by 100-plus metre height and not by the forests, biodiversity, geology, ecosystem services and ecological security it provides to its citizens. The future of Delhi-National Capital Region and much of north India is “golden” (through desertification) and lifeless (without clean air and water), roasted by the intense heat and lack of rain which the 100-plus meter definition of Aravallis is going to wreak on us. Not much is expected from the High Level Committee appointed by the Supreme Court order of December 29, 2025, as it works on the same premise of defining the Aravallis for mining and not on conservation and restoration of the range.

(Prakriti Srivastava is a former officer of the Indian Forest Service)

This column was originally published as part of the cover story Chaos in definition in the January 16-31, 2026 print edition of Down To Earth