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The Supreme Court took a unique stance when it asked the National Green Tribunal Chairman, to allocate a case to the same bench who had heard it earlier and gave judgment on the same. The SC passed this in response to an appeal filed by an NGO 'Citizens for Doon' and few local residents who said that the NGT could not reserve proprietary rights to deal with the original Application and that such an act is unfair. The SC accepted the submission and said that the case would be heard by the same beach who had heard it earlier.
The application challenged the 'Char Dham Highway Project' in Uttarkhand alleging that the project imposed the widening of 900 KMS of double lane highway in the Himalayan region that would be leading to a diversion of a vast area of forest area that is reserved for forestation and is ecologically fragile. It is alleged that this project did not take a clearance of EIA and also was in complete violation of the Forest Conservation Act, 1980. This case was heard by a bench headed by Justice Dr. Jawad Rahim, Justice SP Wangdi, Dr. Nagin Nanda. The bench had not given any permission to the felling of trees and said that there shall be no such activities that would harm the environment. To the appellant’s surprise the matter was listed before another bench headed by justice Adarsh Kumar Goel on August 9. The appellants were shocked that how can a matter that was originally set to be heard on May 31 be redirected and heard by another bench. The newly formed bench was not even a part of the former bench. Also, the order passed on August 6 was not uploaded on the NGT website.
The appellant’s filed an application seeking the order passed on August 6 and 9 be reviewed. The application was listed before the bench of Justice A.K. Goel, Justice DRM Jawad Rahim, Dr. Nagin Nanda. The tribunal however rejected the prayer of the applicant and dismissed the review Application.
The appeal in the SC against this dismissal was considered by a bench of Justice Rohinton F Nariman and Justice Indu Malhotra. Advocate Sanjay Parikh said that in the best interest of things the matter should go back to the original bench that had hear it. Supreme Court observed that since the matter has been a complex one and has been heard over several days, rehearing will only be on some final aspects. SC bench disposed the matter requesting the NGT Chairman to grant one day time to the tribunal to dispose the matters before it.
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