Down To Earth brings you the top environmental cases heard in the Supreme Court, the high courts and the National Green Tribunal
The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has stalled the establishment of a common bio-medical waste treatment facility (CBWTF), by Punchakran Pvt Ltd, in the industrial area of the Sambhal district in Uttar Pradesh.
The NGT order September 2, 2022, was in response to an application filed by Aniruda Panwar. The petitioner approached the tribunal for the cancellation of consent and environmental clearance granted for the same.
The company was granted permission to operate in the State Industrial Development Corporation’s (UPSIDC) industrial area.
CBWTF, an industry under the red category, is not eligible to operate in UPSIDC as the area is meant for industries under green category, the petitioner argued.
CBWTF misrepresented that the unit to be set up was under green category, they added.
Industries are categorised into red, orange and green on the basis of their Pollution Index. The industries with a higher Pollution Index of 60 and above are categorised as red and those with scores between 15 and 29 are categorised as green.
The NGT has directed construction company Key Stone Properties to pay Rs 4,4742,188 to the Maharashtra State Pollution Control Board (MPCB) within two months.
The amount should be used for implementing the district environment plan within six months, the tribunal added. A specific plan for the utilisation of the amount has to be prepared by a joint committee, consisting of MPCB, district magistrate and the commissioner of Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation, stated the NGT September 1, 2022.
The tribunal was responding to a petition alleging that the constructions raised by the company violated the Environment Impact Assessment Notification, 2006. Prior Environmental Clearance (EC) was not obtained for the same, the petitioner argued.
The NGT has directed the West Bengal government to evict encroachers from a waterbody linked to the Damodar Valley Corporation Canal. The state government is liable to evict all the encroachers and should restore the waterbody to its original character, the NGT stated.
The NGT Eastern Zone Bench in Kolkata August 30, was responding to a petition. The waterbody in the Hooghly district in West Bengal was a source of irrigation and it was destroyed due to illegal constructions, the petitioners argued.
Vivek Kamboj, a petitioner, raised objections to the report furnished by a committee constituted in compliance with an NGT order dated July 1, 2022.
The petitioner had challenged the forest clearances issued by the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change in 2021.
Permission was given to divert forest land for constructing the 4/6 lane of the Gurugram-Pataudi-Rewari section of National Highway-352W.
The forest diversion constitutes the felling of 8,373 trees and 3,948 plants in the Gurugram forest division and 4,049 trees and 4,137 plants in the Rewari forest division.
The Joint Committee had wrongly stated that no degraded land is available in Gurugram forest division, due to which the compensatory afforestation is being undertaken 280 kilometres from the project location, the petitioner stated.
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