The Supreme Court on Friday clarified that its order, which stayed government directives allowing retrospective environmental clearance to projects affecting critical ecology, will not affect competent authorities from considering applications seeking modification/alteration of schemes cleared prior to July 7, 2021.
The top court had on January 2 stayed the implementation of two office memorandums issued by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) of July 7, 2021 and January 20, 2022. The memorandums permitted the ex post facto environmental clearance of projects. The notifications countermanded an earlier Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) notification of 2006 which required prior approval of projects.
On Friday, several project proponents sought a clarification on whether the court’s stay would affect applications seeking modifications to projects which had already got a valid environmental clearance prior to July 7, 2021.
Clearing the air
A Bench headed by Justice B.R. Gavai cleared the air, recording in an order that the January 2 stay would not “come in the way of competent authorities considering proposals for modifications/alterations in the environmental clearances if the projects have valid environmental clearance prior to July 7, 2021”.
Appearing for NGO Vanashakti, which had secured the stay order in the Supreme Court against the 2021-2022 office memorandums, senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan highlighted the risk of applicants expanding projects substantially beyond the scope for which they had got permission.
“Permission for every modification should be sought in advance… Every time they go for expansion, they have to get prior permission. Without prior permission, they can go over forests, rivers…” he submitted.
Consequently, the Bench directed that “applications for expansions should be considered by authorities strictly in accordance with law as it existed prior to July 7, 2021”.
The court pronounced the stay order on January 2 after the NGO argued that the standard operating procedure (SOP) for ex post facto environmental clearance contained in the July 2021 office memorandum violated the existing 2006 EIA notification, which compelled prior approval of projects.
