Javadekar defends giving partial report on Uttarakhand dams to SC

Says the govt will not submit the full expert report

Union Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar on Monday defended his ministry’s controversial selective disclosure to the Supreme Court, saying the Centre wasn’t asked to give the full committee report on the six new hydropower projects being approved on upper Ganga basin in Uttarakhand. Speaking at a media function in Delhi on Monday, he said the ministry’s reply was based on the apex court’s specific queries.

“We had submitted a detailed affidavit to the court in December last year. The apex court hadn’t asked for a full committee report. The recent submission was as per the court’s specific inquiries regarding the status of the six projects and the legalities at the time of giving clearances to them,” Javadekar said.

Business Standard had reported how the ministry had submitted only selective bits of its experts’ opinions to the Supreme Court recently on the matter. The government-appointed experts had said the projects had legitimate but outdated green clearances. They had said the clearances were not comprehensive and how the projects would impact eco-fragile region after the Uttarakhand tragedy had morphed the geography and physical features of the region. They had strongly advised that the six projects should not be given a go-ahead in their current state. They had warned that the dams could have huge impact on people, ecology and safety of the region.

But the Centre had chosen to tell the apex court only that the dams had almost all the required clearances, with the attorney-general stating that the projects were in order to be given the nod. The Supreme Court had reflected the government’s views as such in its orders pushing the case for the projects.

“Mukul Rohatgi, learned attorney-general for the Union of India, has submitted that in pursuance of the aforesaid order, the affidavit is ready and he has instructions to state that the six projects mentioned in the aforequoted order, are worthy of clearance,” the apex court said in its order dated February 17.

On Monday, the minister said the apex court, in its December order, had asked the Union government about the date of environment clearance to the six hydro-projects located on the upper Ganga basin of Uttarakhand, the laws prevalent at the time of allotment and deficiencies. He said the ministry had replied to this specific question before the court.

But the court had also asked the government to carry out a cluster (or cumulative) impact of the six projects to assess their impact afresh. The four-member expert committee, following both the orders of the Supreme Court had carried out the cumulative impact assessment of the dams also verified the techno-legal status of clearances that these projects had secured years back. The committee, in its single comprehensive report, had noted that each of the six projects in their current shape grave threat to the region and should not be given the nod. They had warned that one of the projects was likely to also add to the threat to the Badrinath Shrine in Uttarakhand.

The government’s affidavit, as the minister said on Monday, had only reflected the ministry’s views on one of the two orders of the apex court and remained silent on the other leading to the court perceiving it as a nod to the projects from the Centre.