Post Facto Environmental Clearance
CONTEXT
- The Environment Ministry has directed appraisal bodies to restart the processing of pending cases involving post-facto environmental clearance, following the Supreme Court’s decision allowing existing applications to proceed to their legal conclusion.
- However, no new applications can be entertained through the retrospective clearance mechanism.
KEY HIGHLIGHTS
- Post facto environmental clearance applies to projects that were started, expanded or modernised without obtaining prior environmental approval.
- The Supreme Court reiterated that prior environmental clearance is mandatory, unless the relevant law is amended.
- The mechanism introduced in 2017 was intended as a limited one time amnesty, while a 2021 Office Memorandum continued this route.
- Allowing projects to seek approval after construction may weaken the preventive nature of environmental assessment and turn it into a penalty based regularisation process.
- Pending cases must still undergo scientific environmental appraisal, along with remediation measures and determination of liability for violations.
KEY CONCEPTS
- Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA): A process that evaluates the likely ecological and social consequences of a proposed project before approval is granted.
- Precautionary Principle: Environmental action should be taken to prevent potential harm even when complete scientific certainty about the damage is unavailable.
WAY FORWARD
- Legacy cases should be resolved through a transparent process, with restoration costs imposed wherever necessary and deliberate violations prosecuted.
- Environmental approvals for future projects must remain prior to project commencement, participatory and based on cumulative ecological impacts.