Centre for completing environment clearances in 100 days

Seeking to avoid delay in granting forest and environment approvals, the Centre today asked its state authorities to complete the process of government clerances within 100 days.
Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar chaired a meeting with top officials of various state-level environment impact authorities and emphasised on adhering to the time-frame so that delays could be cut down.
Javadekar had earlier said that after the Modi government's coming to power, his ministry has brought down the average time period for environmental clearances for projects from 600 to 190 days and aims to further reduce it to 100 days to provide ease of doing 'responsible' business.

"As far as environment and forest approvals are concerned, we have made all processes online. Yesterday, we launched a new portal whereby even at district level, the process has been made online for sand and other minor minerals.
"We called a meeting of officials of state level environment impact authorities. Now state-level approvals are also online. We are giving them (authorities) 100 days time. Within 100 days, the whole process should be completed. Delays should be deleted. Approvals to be granted on merit," Javadekar told reporters.
He said that if required, much stricter conditions can be imposed by the state authorities but the process has to be completed within the time frame (100 days).

He said that in the last two years, around 15,000 approvals (both forest and environment) had been given by the state-level authorities for various projects.

"Without diluting any environmental norms, the process has to be completed within the given time-frame. To bring efficiency and avoid delays, we have set a target of 100 days. This way, we can provide ease of doing responsible business," Javadekar said.
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The University Grants Commission (UGC) has also advised varsities and colleges that for the grants given by it to them, they may adopt the policy of transactions for utilisation of grants through bank transfers, credit or debit cards and cheques and only in rare cases drafts or cash transfers may be undertaken.