Draft EIA notification will promote land grab: Jairam

Vibha Sharma

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, July 25

Putting on record his “strongest objections” to the draft Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) Notification 2020, former Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh today said proposed changes in environmental clearance process for infrastructure projects “will routinely legitimise illegality and promote land grab, not development”.

“Environmental regulation is not an unnecessary burden but an essential obligation for the health and welfare of our people and sustainable development,” Ramesh cautioned Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar in a letter marked to Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu also.

Ramesh, who is the Chairman of the Standing Committee on Science and Technology, Environment, Forests and Climate Change, said the proposed changes were not based on audits, assessments and analyses or any research, and reflected a mindset that sees environmental regulation as an unnecessary regulatory burden.

“The Chairman of the Rajya Sabha very recently in his characteristic style said nature plus culture is equal to future. I am marking a copy of this letter to him as well so as to let him know how the equation he has so rightly and nicely formulated will be thrown out of the window if the draft EIA Notification 2020 becomes a reality,” Ramesh said.

“The draft notification allows post facto approvals that go against very principle of assessment and public participation prior to environment clearance and has provisions that will routinely legitimise illegality,” he said.

Ex-Environment Minister’s concerns

• Former Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh has said the draft Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) Notification 2020 reduces public participation and does away with public hearings with a large category of projects and environment impact assessment altogether
• Ramesh, who heads the House panel on environment, said it increases validity of environment clearances, allowing projects to ‘secure’ land for long duration even when they are not constructed, which will promote land grab and not development

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