New Delhi, November 20: India’s Supreme Court on Tuesday overturned its own earlier ruling and allowed retrospective environmental clearances for infrastructure projects, saying that demolishing completed or near-completed structures would amount to “throwing valuable public resources in dustbin.”
A two-judge majority led by Chief Justice B.R. Gavai and Justice K. Vinod Chandran upheld review petitions filed by a developers’ consortium, a central public sector enterprise and a state government against a May 16 judgment that had struck down the Centre’s 2017 notification permitting post-facto approvals. Review petitions rarely succeed at the top court, with a historical success rate of less than 0.1%.
The majority said the 2017 notification and a 2021 office memorandum already provide for heavy penalties on violators and that allowing projects of “vital public importance” to be razed would cause avoidable financial loss. “Demolition of the projects already completed… would result in throwing the valuable public resources in dustbin,” the Chief Justice said in the judgment.
Justice Ujjwal Bhuyan, who wrote a sharply worded dissent, warned that granting retrospective clearances undermined environmental jurisprudence and encouraged deliberate violations of the law. He said the “deadly Delhi smog” served as a daily reminder of the hazards of pollution and insisted that the right to clean air was a component of the constitutional right to life.
Environmental groups argue that the 2017 notification conflicts with the Environment Protection Act and the 2006 Environment Impact Assessment rules, which mandate environmental clearance before project construction begins.
The dissent noted that the Supreme Court had a duty to safeguard the environment and “cannot be seen backtracking” on its established principles, especially on a review filed by those showing “scant regard for the rule of law.”
The ruling drew political criticism as well. Congress leader Jairam Ramesh called the verdict “disappointing,” saying retrospective approvals let companies bypass environmental norms with a “baadme dekha jayega” (we’ll see later) attitude. He contrasted the decision with recent pro-environment orders by the Chief Justice, including actions related to tiger reserves and mining restrictions near protected areas.
Scientists have repeatedly warned that unchecked infrastructure expansion has contributed to fatal landslides and flash floods in Uttarakhand. The May 16 judgment had originally come in response to a public interest petition filed by NGO Vanshakti challenging the 2017 notification.
