Centre didn’t comply with NGT order: Plea

The Union government has not complied with the National Green Tribunal’s (NGT) April 3, 2023 order on revisiting the deficiencies in the environmental clearance granted to the Great Nicobar Holistic Development project, a petitioner challenging the green nod to the key project has claimed before NGT.

- Jayashree Nandi

In a 39-page detailed submission made on July 24 by petitioner-environmentalist Ashish Kothari said the objective of this application is to seek the enforcement and implementation of the law. The petitioner highlighted that the three terms of reference for the NGT-appointed high-powered committee (HPC) were not met—specifically related to coral transplantation, environmental baseline data collection and review coastal regulation zone (CRZ) boundaries of the proposed port project.

On April 3, 2023, NGT directed that clearance dated November 11, 2022 be revisited in the light of “some unanswered deficiencies” pointed out by the appellants which need to be addressed. “By way of instance, it is pointed out that out of 20,668 coral colonies, 16,150 are proposed to be translocated without any mention of threat to the remaining 4,518 coral colonies. It is pointed out that ICRZ Regulations prohibit destruction of corals. Further, data collected for impact assessment is only of one season as against requirement of three seasons. It is also shown that part of the project is in the CRZ IA area where Port is prohibited,” the NGT had said.

HT had reported on April 7, 2023 that NGT had constituted a high-powered committee, headed by Union environment ministry secretary, to revisit the environmental clearance (EC) granted by the ministry to the Great Nicobar township and area development project. Experts, however, have questioned how a subordinate authority headed by the environment secretary revisit the green nod granted by its own ministry?