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The Uttarakhand High Court, on January 6, 2025, suspended all mining operations in Bageshwar district with immediate effect. The court commissioners had submitted a report in compliance with an order dated December 9, 2024, which the bench of Chief Justice Guhanathan Narendar and Justice Manoj Kumar Tiwari called “alarming” and “shocking”.
“The report and the photographs clearly demonstrate complete lawlessness by the miners and are proof of local administration turning a blind eye to the transgression,” the order said.
The report and photographs, prima facie, indicate that continued mining operations, which have already caused damage to residential properties, are likely to trigger landslides and result in a significant loss of life. “It is ironic that trained officers allowed mining at the base of a hillock when habitations in the revenue villages are located on top of the hillock,” the high court stated.
The photographs also revealed large crevices, signalling impending landslides that could lead to catastrophic loss of life. Pending further orders, all mining operations in Bageshwar district stand suspended with immediate effect, the judges ruled.
The High Court directed that the order be communicated to the director of the Geology And Mining Department, Uttarakhand, who must ensure its implementation and notify the miners accordingly.
The director was held responsible for enforcing the order. Additionally, the Amicus Curiae has been directed to identify and include all leaseholders and relevant department officials as respondents in the public interest litigation.
A compliance report submitted by the Jal Shakti (Irrigation and Flood Control) Department, Jammu, on January 6, 2025, informed the National Green Tribunal (NGT) that the construction of the barrage on the Tawi river fully adheres to government guidelines, rules and regulations.
“The hydraulic study, design and drawings of the barrage at Tawi river have been vetted by the Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, taking into consideration safeguard and structural stability,” the report informed the tribunal.
The Tawi barrage project, conceptualised in 2010, involves constructing a gated structure across two channels of the river — Nikki Tawi and Waddi Tawi — located at Belicharana, approximately a kilometre downstream from the main Tawi bridge at Bikram Chowk.
The barrage is designed to create a pondage of 1.35 million cubic metres (MCM) with a pondage level of 297.8 metres. “There shall be no stoppage of water downstream of the barrage at any point of time and therefore, there shall be no effect on the ecology of the river,” the report said.
The total waterway for the barrage has been designed to accommodate a 1-in-500-year flood return period, far exceeding the flood discharge recorded during the 2014 floods. Consequently, there is no risk of flooding due to the barrage’s construction, the report concluded.
The document was submitted in compliance with an NGT order dated September 18, 2024, in response to a news article titled Tawi Barrage and Riverfront Projects in Jammu Destroying River, Inviting Disaster, published on the website for non-governmental organisation South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People [sandrp.in] on May 11, 2024.
The timelines outlined in the 2019 action plan for cleaning the Pawana river have already expired, according to a report filed by the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) with the NGT on January 4, 2025.
The action plan for rejuvenating the polluted stretch of the Pawana River, classified under Priority Class II, was approved by the CPCB task team on March 28, 2019. It is being implemented by Maharashtra state agencies, with progress reviewed periodically by the state’s River Rejuvenation Committee and the Central Monitoring Committee, chaired by the secretary for the Union Ministry of Jal Shakti.
The Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation December 30, 2024 submitted an updated status report on the action plan to the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board. It noted that most of the tasks, especially those related to sewage management, remain incomplete. “The timelines specified in the approved action plan for Pawana river of 2019 are already over,” the report said.
The updated status primarily highlights the current situation regarding sewage generation and treatment, alongside various ongoing projects, but fails to provide revised or specific timelines for their completion, the CPCB report added.
The matter concerns the increasing biochemical oxygen demand levels in the Pawana river, a crucial drinking water source for Pimpri-Chinchwad city, Maharashtra. The river has now entered Priority 1, the most polluted category, as per the CPCB report.