In a significant legal development, the Pune bench of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) has overturned an order by the Gujarat State Environmental Impact Assessment Authority (SEIAA) that had rejected environmental clearances for 56 stone quarry units. The tribunal's ruling, delivered on December 9, provides a major relief to the quarry operators and directs the SEIAA to reconsider the matter after resolving critical data discrepancies.
The Core of the Dispute: Distance Norms and Data
The controversy began with an order issued by the Gujarat SEIAA on January 1, 2025. In that directive, the authority cancelled the environmental clearances previously granted to the quarries by district-level Environmental Impact Assessment Authorities (EIAAs). The SEIAA's primary objection was that the lease areas for these stone quarrying operations were situated within riverbeds and on roads. This, they argued, violated specific distance norms established by the NGT's principal bench in a ruling dated September 9, 2020.
The SEIAA's decision was based on its interpretation of the quarry locations in relation to these protected zones. However, the quarry operators challenged this interpretation, leading to the filing of 56 separate appeals before the NGT's Pune bench.
NGT's Verdict: A Question of Incorrect Coordinates
The bench, comprising Justice Dinesh Kumar Singh and expert member Sujit Kumar Bajpayee, heard the appeals. In its detailed order of December 9, the tribunal scrutinized the evidence, including a report and an affidavit filed just a day earlier on December 8. The NGT found a fundamental flaw in the SEIAA's assessment.
The tribunal observed a clear discrepancy in the geographical coordinates of the leased mining areas. The coordinates mentioned in the official mining plans and Detailed Survey Reports (DSR) did not match the locations assumed by the SEIAA when it applied the NGT's distance norms. "Because of the discrepancy... in the geographical location of the leased area, because geographical coordinates in the mining plan of the DSR of these areas are found to be different. Therefore, distance criteria would certainly be affected," the bench noted.
Advocate Saurabh Kulkarni, who represented the appealing quarry operators, explained to the Times of India that his clients had submitted maps, images, and precise coordinates. When these coordinates were plotted on cadastral and terrestrial maps, they showed the lease areas to be in different positions than what the SEIAA had presumed. This misalignment was central to the case.
Directives and Future Implications
The NGT bench concluded that unless these foundational discrepancies in location data were resolved, the SEIAA could not conduct a proper and fair assessment of the clearances granted by the district EIAAs. Consequently, the tribunal set aside the SEIAA's January 1 order.
The NGT has now directed the Gujarat SEIAA to reconsider the entire matter afresh. However, this reconsideration must only happen after the authority ensures that the issues regarding the correct geographical plotting of the quarry lease areas are conclusively addressed. This puts the onus on the regulatory body to verify the factual basis of its objections before making a final decision.
This ruling underscores the critical importance of accurate geographical data in environmental regulation and governance. It also highlights the role of judicial oversight in ensuring that administrative decisions are based on verifiable facts, providing a recourse for industries when they believe regulatory actions are founded on incorrect premises.
