Will raze a part of illegal battalion: Assam to NGT

The Assam Police Housing Corporation Limited, in an affidavit filed last week to the National Green Tribunal, apologised for illegally clearing forest land to house a police battalion in Innerline Reserved Forest under Hailakandi Division, and also offered to demolish part of the facility so as to make the project eligible for prior environmental clearance.

- Abraham Thomas

NEW DELHI:

This undertaking was given by the Assam government after it came to light that they had gone ahead with the construction of the battalion, involving diversion of 11.5 ha of forest land, not only without prior forest clearance but also prior environmental clearance.

In February, the Supreme Court temporarily halted the process of granting ex-post facto or retrospective environment clearance by which mining projects with admitted environmental violations were getting the green nod for operations in violation of the environment impact assessment (EIA) notification of 2006 that mandates prior environmental clearance before starting any project. A bench of justices BR Gavai and Sandeep Mehta stayed two orders issued by the ministry of environment forests and climate change (MoEFCC) in this regard on July 7, 2021 and January 28, 2022 on a plea filed by NGO Vanashakti.

In its affidavit, the state proposed to dismantle part of the facility. The NGT bench headed by NGT chairperson, Prakash Shrivastava, weighed in on the importance of prior environmental clearance and concerns posed post facto clearances during the hearing of its suo motu case based on a news article titled: "Assam PCCF MK Yadava accused of illegally clearing protected forest for Commando Battalion."