AG tells ministry it can refuse forest clearance for Vedanta project

Times of India, July 23, 2010
NEW DELHI: The Union environment and forests ministry has armed itself to tighten the noose against the Vedanta project in Orissa. It has sought and received an opinion from the Attorney General that the ministry, despite a Supreme Court order, still holds the legal mandate to refuse forest clearance to the company.

Alongside the ministry has also widened the scope of investigations headed by the National Advisory Council member, N C Saxena, into the impacts of and legal issues concerning the project.

While the AG's advice to the ministry could help bolster its case for not providing the mandatory forest clearance under the Forest Conservation Act, 1980, an adverse report from the four-member Saxena committee could provide the ground to the ministry to block the controversial project on issues of tribal rights and concerns.

Issues have been raised earlier about the impact of the project on the wildlife and forests of the area as well as tribal entitlements under the Forest Rights Act.

The ministry has already received one report from a committee, which had pointed to serious deficiencies in the project and its unfavourable consequences on the primitive tribal group -- Dongria Kondh -- living in the region where bauxite mines for the Vedanta aluminium plant exist.

As per orders of the apex court, sister concern Sterlite Industries was given permission to work on the project while Orissa Mining Corporation is to excavate in Lanjigarh tehsil of Kalahandi for the bauxite.

The environment ministry had tended to earlier take the view that the Supreme Court order had vitiated the need for the company to apply for a clearance to divert forest land in Lanjigarh. It had perceived that the court had handed the ministry a fait accompli.

But the AG has now suggested that the SC had only permitted the company to go ahead and apply to the ministry and ordered the ministry to provide clearance in accordance with existing regulations and laws.

On the other hand, the N C Saxena committee has now got the mandate to "inquire and investigate any issue which the committee members might feel necessary for the purposes of their report". The committee, unlike what its terms of references provided earlier, would also look at the issues of `resource displacement', physical and economic displacement that could be potentially caused due to the project. The earlier MoEF committee had pointed the weakness of the project on these counts.