SC PULLS UP NGT FOR 'UNILATERAL DECISIONS', ASKS TRIBUNAL TO ACT WITH 'PROCEDURAL INTEGRITY'

In an unusual order, the Supreme Court has pulled up the National Green Tribunal (NGT) for its “recurrent engagement” in “unilateral decision making” and cautioned that in “its zealous quest for justice, the tribunal must tread carefully to avoid the oversight of propriety”.

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These hard-hitting observations were made by a bench of Justices P S Narasimha and Aravind Kumar in its verdict on appeals filed by a Delhi-based business enterprises, which has challenged two orders of the green panel where it had slapped fine on the firm, in a suo motu proceedings for polluting the environment, without even giving it an opportunity to be heard.

“The National Green Tribunal’s recurrent engagement in unilateral decision making, provisioning ex-post facto review hearings and routinely dismissing it has regrettably become a prevailing norm. In its zealous quest for justice, the tribunal must tread carefully to avoid the oversight of propriety,” the bench said in its January 30 order, uploaded on Wednesday. It added that the practice of ex-parte orders and the imposition of damages amounting to crores of rupees, have proven to be a counterproductive force in the broader mission of environmental safeguarding.