Letters: Unfair assessment

An article in your newspaper by Nitin Sethi, titled "Appeals against green min to lie with new body not NGT" (October 12), says, inter alia, the proposed amendments reduce the powers of the National Green Tribunal and the new "adjudicating authority" will become the first point of appeal against decisions of the environment ministry. Both these conclusions are unjustified on a plain reading of the proposed amendments.

The "adjudicating authority" is proposed to be created under a new Section 14D(1) of the Environment (Protection) Act, 1988 (EPA), to be inserted by the Amendment Bill. The purpose of this adjudicating authority is described in the second half of Section 14D(1) as, "... the purpose of adjudicating under Sections 14A and 14C...". Sections 14A and 14C are new sections proposed to be inserted into the EPA and impose penalties on persons causing "substantial damage to the environment" and persons not complying with the environmental clearances (EC). The NGT's powers are not being reduced since it never had jurisdiction to apply these penalties. In respect of the EC granted under the EPA, the NGT can, under separate provisions of the NGT Act, still examine the correctness of the grant of such ECs or, if anyone was affected as a result of the breach of these ECs, grant them compensation for such damage suffered. None of these provisions under the NGT Act are proposed to be amended.

To that extent, the two conclusions do not seem to be justified.

Alok Prasanna Kumar
Senior Resident Fellow, Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy, New Delhi

Nitin Sethi responds:

Under the current law while the ministry and its arms are empowered to act upon violations, there is no legal mechanism under the rules or the law for a third party to seek redress against any breach of EPA or the consequent environmental damage to personal or public resources from the government. That can be redressed by the NGT at present. By bringing in the new amendments, the first level of appeal has been transferred to officers of the rank of director, serving government officers/district judge to be appointed by the ministry through a select committee as the adjudicating body. Neither the formation of the select committee nor how it will select the adjudicating body has been put in the law. It would be part of the rules. They shall be adjudicating upon decisions of the minister and senior officials (all clearances have mandatory approval of the minister and the secretary). An appeal against the orders of the adjudicating body will, under the proposed amendment, lie with the NGT.

The existing NGT Act will continue to retain provisions for hearing appeals against all the decisions of the government under EPA and some other green laws, with the adjudicating body also being considered part of the government. The NGT would continue to be empowered to provide compensation for relief or damages caused and other penalties under the EPA. The amendments do not make it clear if the NGT can also impose the new penalties imposed by the amendments or only ask the adjudicating body to review them upon appeal.

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