The National Green Tribunal (NGT) today allowed mining major Vedanta to enter its administrative unit inside its Sterlite copper plant at Tuticorin in Tamil Nadu, observing that no environmental damage would be caused by allowing access to the administrative section.
A bench headed by chairperson A K Goel, however, said the plant would remain closed and the company would not have access to its production unit and directed the district magistrate to ensure this.
"The district magistrate will ensure that the appellants do not have access to the production unit. We are concerned with the environment. No environmental damage can be caused by allowing access to the administrative section," the bench said.
The green panel also directed the Tamil Nadu State Pollution Control Board to submit an analysis of the baseline pollution data of the State Industries Promotion Corporation of Tamil Nadu Ltd in Tuticorin to ascertain the level of pollution.
The matter will be next heard on August 20.
At the outset, the bench, also comprising Justice Jawad Rahim and S P Wangdi, rejected the state government's submission that the tribunal did not have the jurisdiction to hear the case and said that it would hear the case on merits.
Senior advocate C S Vaidyanathan, appearing for the state government, said the tribunal should pass a written order if it was rejecting its objection over maintainability of Vedanta's plea.
Senior advocate Rakesh Dwivedi, appearing for the state pollution control board, said that Vedanta was indulging in "forum shopping" and the NGT should not entertain it.
The tribunal, however, said that it would proceed ahead with the case on merits.
Senior advocate C A Sundaram, appearing for Vedanta, said this is a "completely motivated" litigation as no prior notices were issued to the copper smelting plant before issuing the closure order.
"The company produces 40 per cent of India's copper and if we shut down, then we have to go back to importing copper from China and Germany. Not one order issued to us refers to pollution, it just said that people have complained. We are a zero discharge unit. It is a completely politically motivated litigation where truckloads of people were brought from outside to protest. Today, there are protests on the other side as the entire area has become unemployed the senior advocate said while blaming the politicians for causing a mistrust.
The tribunal then asked the senior lawyer whether "they are polluting?".
Sundaram replied in the negative and said, "Give us a chance for a month. We will run and show you that we are not polluting."
Seeking scientific data from the state pollution control board, the bench observed, "You keep on saying Sterlite is polluting but not providing any substantiative data for that."
Reacting on the tribunal's order, the company said in a statement, "We welcome the National Green Tribunal's decision to accept the maintainability of our petition and hear the same. We further welcome the NGT's interim order that gives us access to the administrative section of the plant."
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