Karnataka High Court rules out any more projects in the Western Ghats

The Karnataka High Court today disposed off the writ petition filed by environmentalists in the state against the mini-hydro projects that were to come up in the Western Ghats.

The writ petition (number 9333/2009) was disposed by Chief Justice Sridhar Rao and Justice Abdul Nazir. The petitioner Prashant G Yavagal and the Western Ghats Environment Forum have been fighting the award of 20 micro-hydro electric projects in the Karnataka part of the Western Ghats.

“This was a landmark victory for the struggle against mindless developmental projects in the environmentally sensitive Western Ghats,” Prashant told DNA.

“The high court action has saved many water bodies being fragmented, leading to destruction of habitats of many species of animals and birds, including tigers, elephants, great pied hornbills and several other endangered species in the rich, evergreen Shola Forests of the Western Ghats,” Gubbi told DNA.

Out of 20 projects, eight of them had secured permission from the forest department by splitting the projects into two, to bring down the forest area required under five hectares. It was done to avoid legal scrutiny that is mandatory under the law for projects that require forestland above five hectares and above 25 MW capacity.

This was a serious manipulation and violation of Forest Act, but it was done by the department.

Following the writ petition, the authorities of the forest department and Karnataka Renewable Energy Limited have cancelled ten projects that the petitioners challenged in the HC. The state government also filed an affidavit in the court that no new mini-hydel projects would be permitted in the Western Ghats.
Satisfied with the action taken by the authorities, and based on these affidavits filed by the forest department, the court disposed off the writ petitions, said an advocate MK Ramesh.

In many such cases of violations, it so happens that the tail of one project is the mouth of another. Observations made by different environmental groups active in the Western Ghats point out that such intensive development projects in the Western Ghats will  fragment habitats and migration routes existing ever since the formation of the ghats. This would lead to an increased confrontation between humans and animals.

A project implemented by Maruthi Power Gen India Limited, which had circumvented the law and encroached on forestland, has been asked to approach the authorities with a fresh application. A case of forest offence has also been filed against the company. Based on this, the state government recommended the cancellation of lease of the projects implemented by Maruthi Power Gen India Private Limited on 17-07-2012.

Anu Chengappa and MK Ramesh represented the petitioners in the court. The activists felt that this landmark decision should also help environmentalists working in other states that share the Western Ghats, including Tamil Nadu (Nilgiris) Kerala, Goa and Maharashtra, where the governments have cleared as many as 132 hydro electric projects of various sizes.