PANJIM: The Centre reiterated, on Wednesday, in its affidavit before the Green Tribunal that it was not processing the Madhav Gadgil’s Western Ghats ecology expert panel’s report but instead would follow the K Kasturirangan report, since many of the former’s findings if implemented are likely to delay environmental clearances of the state’s mines.
The affidavit filed on Wednesday stated, “The ministry does not wish to process the WGEEP report… and would take subsequent actions only in relation to the HLWG (high level working group) report…”
The ministry also informed the bench that it has published a draft notification in the gazette of India declaring ecologically sensitive areas in the Western Ghats on March 10, 2014. The notification is presently pending for consideration of objections, if any.
The affidavit, in response to an order of NGT of August 25 where it was asked to explain its position with regard to the Gadgil report, further mentioned that the ministry had constituted HLWG on August 17, 2012 to examine the WGEEP report in a holistic and multidisciplinary fashion keeping in view the comments received from concerned state governments, central ministries and stakeholders.
The matter is now postponed for September 9 after MoEF prayed for time to seek instructions and file appropriate affidavit on whether there could be extension of areas for eco sensitive zones.
Meanwhile, Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar in a statement in the assembly after the judgment of the High Court that directed the government to execute the 27 lease deeds had said that the pending applications would be decided in accordance with the law with mining leases to be signed by October, all clearances would be obtained within a month or so and extraction would start by December.
