NEW DELHI: Adani Ports and
SEZ has challenged the environment ministry's decision to impose penalties on it for environmental violations, setting the stage for a faceoff between the government and the company, possibly even a legal battle.
In a letter to the ministry dated October 14, a copy of which has been viewed by ET, APSEZ has challenged each of the seven penalties, saying the conditions have been either complied with or are not applicable to the company.
The ministry had derived these penalties from the report of a committee, headed by environmentalist Sunita Narain, set up to probe persistent complaints of environmental violations at the Adani port, power plant and SEZ complex at Mundra in Gujarat. The report, submitted in April, found that APSEZ had committed serious environmental violations.
The issue could impact the Adani Group's plans to build Australia's largest coal mine and port complex. Earlier this month, a Guardian report said the Australian government, in the aftermath of the Narain Committee report, has sought documents related to Adani's Indian violations.
Among other things, the Narain Committee said the company had hidden the true nature of its projects to obtain faster clearances. It had, for instance, delinked the port and SEZ components. It had avoided public hearings "on one pretext or another". It said the company might have even "started work prior to receiving environmental clearance".
In its final recommendations, the committee suggested, among other things, that the environment clearance (EC) for North Port — one of the port expansion projects — be scrapped. It also suggested the company set up an environmental restoration fund with a corpus of Rs 200 crore or 1% of the project cost, whichever is higher.
The ministry then invited responses from the company, after which it imposed a set of penalties, more or less based on the Narain Committee's recommendations. The Adani letter, written by APSEZ head-environment PN Roy Chowdhury, says: "There is no noncompliance or violation of the terms of the (EC)...by us". On the fund, it says: "We, therefore, respectfully request the ministry to reconsider the setup of the environment restoration fund for an amount of Rs 200 crore, which has been subjectively arrived at," adding that it was open to a development fund of "any substantially reduced amount".
In its response, the company asserts that all these representations had been made to the ministry. "No reasons have been disclosed for accepting the recommendations of the committee and also the grounds on which our response has not been accepted," the letter says.
Agrees Supreme Court lawyer Shyam Divan, who has written a book on environmental law and policy in India. "Given that they are subject to a higher appellate authority, all government decisions have to be reasoned. This helps the court or tribunal understand the process through which an order was arrived at," he said. Neither the company nor environment minister Jayanthi Natarajan responded to ET's questionnaires.
According to Ahmedabad-based lawyer Anand Yagnik, who has been arguing cases against APSEZ, the ministry could ask the company to present its case before the Expert Appraisal Committee (EAC), an advisory body of experts that advises the ministry on environmental clearances for projects. Based on what the EAC suggests, he adds, the ministry could take a final call.
One criticism of the Narain Committee report was that the penalties it recommended were small compared to the scale of environmental violations committed. The Environment Protection Act and the Environment Impact Assessment Notification empower the ministry to start criminal prosecution and to cancel environmental clearances if a company violates the conditions under which an EC has been granted.
Source : economictimes.indiatimes.com