The Environment Ministry is all set to begin appraisal of the projects that have violated green norms for granting them post-facto clearances. The move is aimed at giving a much-needed boost to the real-estate and infrastructure sectors and also help the state governments in clearing projects at a faster pace.
The ministry has constituted an expert panel to adjudicate on projects that have begun work without prior environmental clearances and related studies. It notified the panel on Tuesday under provisions of the Environment Protection Act, and it would have a term of three-years to appraise and regularise projects involved in environmental violations, procedural lapses and non-compliance.
If the panel concludes that any project will cause environmental degradation, it would be closed down. On the basis of environmental damage assessed or financial benefit the project proponents have derived, the panel will also recommend a remediation action plan.
The 11-member panel will be chaired by SR Wate, former director of National Environmental Engineering Research Institute, and comprises one ministry scientist, environmental scientists, engineers and marine biologists.
"The Central Government has established an arrangement to appraise the projects, which have started the work without taking prior environmental clearance and such cases have been termed as cases of violation," the notification said.
The constitution of the panel comes three months after the ministry issued a notification, opening a six-month, one-time, window for those project proponents who had not obtained environmental clearances before beginning work. As per this notification, these project proponents, across all categories and sizes, will be allowed to send in their proposal to the ministry till September 14, 2017.
The ministry officials said that they have received more than 276 applications till June 8 for appraisal, under the six-month window, of which majority are from the real-estate sector. The constitution of the panel and the notification allowing a six-month window hinge upon orders of the Jharkhand High Court and National Green Tribunal (NGT). A Jharkhand HC order dated November 28, 2014 and the NGT's order dated July 7, 2015 quashed two office memoranda (OM) of the environment ministry, dated December 12, 2012 and June 27, 2013. These orders allowed for granting environmental clearances to regularize projects that have violated green norms.
The Jharkhand HC's order held the December 2012 OM as void and said that any action against violations would be an independent and separate activity. The NGT quashed both OM's and ruled that under the Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) notification, 2006, applying for an environmental clearance before starting work was mandatory and the ministry's orders could not supersede a superior legislation.
While the environment ministry's move will largely bring relief to housing projects, applications have also come from irrigation sector, mining sector, pharma sector and industries too. A large chunk of the projects belong to Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu. Of 91 applications that have been submitted for environmental clearance, 37 are from Maharashtra while of the 185 applications seeking terms of reference (ToRs) for their projects, 119 are from Tamil Nadu. ToRs specify the environmental and impact assessment studies that are needed before executing a project.
