Down To Earth brings you the top environmental cases heard in the Supreme Court, the high courts and the National Green Tribunal
Justice Sheo Kumar Singh of the National Green Tribunal (NGT)’s Central Zone Bench, Bhopal, said September 19, 2022 that there was an urgent need to augment the utilisation and disposal of fly ash in Chhattisgarh.
Awareness programmes needed to be organised for common people in the state about the utilisation of fly ash for its own use and for making the process of obtaining permission from regulatory authorities easier, the NGT directed.
Strict action should be taken if any complaint regarding illegal disposal was received by the authorities, the court said.
The state authority must instruct all transporters to comply with guidelines issued by the central and state governments for safe transportation of fly ash and bottom ash.
Every fly ash transporter must write on their vehicles: ‘If any illegal dumping of fly ash by this vehicle is seen, please inform collector’, the tribunal said. The contact number of the transporter should be visible clearly. An official letter may be issued to all industries in this regard, the NGT order said.
The state government must fix responsibility and may ask all power plants of the area as to how they would address this issue.
The NGT order was in response to an application filed April 25, 2022 regarding fly ash disposal by the management of BALCO in Korba district.
The application alleged that the fly ash disposal was in violation of rules and was causing adverse effects on human health and agriculture fields.
The Uttarakhand high court has rejected an appeal against the felling of eucalyptus trees for widening a road in Dehradun.
The state government had informed the court August 16, 2022 that 528 of 1,006 eucalyptus trees which were required to be felled for the project of road widening, had already been cut till August 4.
Also, the divisional forest officer had written a letter April 4, 2022, according to which the trees had been planted in 1976, were oversized and had already completed their rotation period (optimum age).
The court said there was no denying the fact that the felling of the 1,006 eucalyptus trees would, at least for some time, adversely impact the environment and also affect the birds and insects which nested on them.
“However, looking to the extent of forest cover in the Doon Valley itself and the state of Uttarakhand as a whole, we cannot accept the submission that the species of birds and insects, which nest on trees, including eucalyptus trees, would be rendered vulnerable,” the court added.
The Maharashtra Bamboo Development Board had set up a chemical treatment plant for bamboo processing within the Gorewada reserve forest in Nagpur without forest clearance.
Thus, the board had violated Section 2 of the Forest Conservation Act by not taking permission from the Centre for using any part of the land given to them for the purpose of plantation for research purpose, the NGT ruled September 19.
The tribunal directed the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board to calculate the compensation amount in accordance with rules.
The Board should proceed to retrieve the amount within two months of giving an opportunity to hear the Maharashtra Bamboo Development Board and ensuring that the said place was restored to its original condition.
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