New Delhi: The Supreme Court as per reports found a potential lapse in forest governance, raising concerns about transparency and the implementation of environmental laws.
In an interim order, the court revealed that the Union Environment Ministry lacks details of state expert committee reports identifying “deemed forests” across the country, despite assurances given to Parliament.
The confusion stems from the 1996 TN Godavarman vs Union of India case, where the court defined “forest” broadly, encompassing even unclassified lands with tree cover. States were mandated to form expert committees to identify such “deemed forests.” However, a recent RTI application by retired forest officer Prakriti Srivastava revealed the ministry’s lack of information on these reports.
The ministry, in its response to the RTI query, stated it doesn’t hold the information and redirected the applicant to individual states. This contradicts an earlier statement made to the Joint Parliamentary Committee, where they claimed to possess and consider expert committee reports when enacting the Forest Conservation Amendment Act 2023.
In response to these discrepancies, the Supreme Court issued a series of directives.
The SC stated that all states and Union Territories must submit expert committee reports by March 31st, 2024.
The Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC) must also compile and digitize these reports, making them publicly available by April 15, 2024.
New expert committees formed under the 2023 Forest Conservation Rules must consider data from the 1996 reports and can expand the definition of protected forests further.
Srivastava questioned the legality of the amended Act being passed without proper data examination.