Deepak Kumar & Anr vs State of Uttarakhand & Ors

This Appeal has been preferred against order of the SEIAA, Uttarakhand dated 12.08.2021 granting EC for establishment of proposed stone crusher plant at Khasra No. 1125 Ka and Ga, village Baluwala, Pargana Pachhwadoon, Tehsil Vikasnagar, District Dehradun.

Objection of the appellant is that Doon Valley is a protected area as per Notification dated 01.02.1989 where stone crushing is not permissible in the light of judgement of Hon’ble Supreme Court in Rural Litigation & Entitlement Kendra v. State of U.P & Ors., AIR 1988 SC 2187. Mining can be commenced only with the permission of the Central Government which has not been obtained in the present case. The location of the stone crusher is on the flood plain of river in violation of Uttarakhand Mineral (Prevention of Illegal Mining, Illegal Transport and Illegal Storage) Rules, 2020. EC has been granted even before license to operate the stone crusher and without conducting any environment impact assessment. There is no permission for extraction of ground water while the EC notes that water requirement will be met from bore-well. This is not permissible in absence of permission for extraction of ground water. It is further stated that in Form-I which is an application for EC, the project activity is said to be building and construction project under Entry 8(a) of the Schedule to the EIA Notification dated 14.09.2006 but the EC mentions the project to be for stone crusher. It is also stated that EC is for 1.433 hectares while the stone crusher is on the area of 3.043 hectares. It is also stated that Director, Geology and Mining is father of Anuj Patrick, the project proponent (PP) and thus the EC/permission is vitiated by bias and conflict of interest.

Having regard to above grievance, we consider it appropriate to verify the factual position to determine whether any intervention of this Tribunal is called for.

Let a joint Committee of CPCB, State PCB and District Magistrate, Dehradun ascertain the factual situation and furnish a factual and action taken report within two months by e-mail at judicial-ngt@gov.in  preferably in the form of searchable PDF/ OCR Support PDF and not in the form of Image PDF. If the Committee finds that there is any illegality involved, the Committee may take remedial action coordinating with the concerned authorities as per law.

The appellant may serve notice on SEIAA, Uttarakhand, M/s Balaji Stone Crusher and Mr. Suresh Lowrence Patrick and also furnish a set of papers to the members of the Committee which we have hereby constituted.

List for further consideration on 03.01.2023.

A copy of this order be forwarded to the SEIAA, Uttarakhand, CPCB, State PCB and District Magistrate, Dehradun by email for compliance.

I.A. No. 224/2022 is for condonation of delay. It is disposed of in view of the statement that appeal was filed within time.

I.A. No. 226/2022 is for exemption from filing translated and clear copies of the annexures. It is disposed of in view of the order passed on merits.