TARUN BHARAT SANGH ALWAR Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner. Tarun Bharat Sangh, Alwar, stated to be a Social Action Group concerned with and working for the protection of Environment and preservation of Wild Life, has brought this public interest action for the enforcement of certain statutory notifications promulgated under the Wild Life, Environmental Protection and Forest Conservation Laws in areas declared as a Reserved Forest in Alwar District of the State of Rajasthan. Issue rule nisi.

(2.) The area, now popularly known as the "Sariska Tiger Park" was, it would appear, an exclusive hunting forest of the Rulers of the Quondam, Alwar State. The area has since been declared as a 'Game Reserve' under the Rajasthan Wild Animals and Birds Protection Act, 1951. The area is also notified pursuant to the Notification dated 1-1-1975, under Sections 29 and 30 of the Rajasthan Forest Act, 1953, as a Reserved Forest. The area is again declared as a sanctuary under Section 35 of the Wild Life Protection Act, 1972. The direct effect of these, it is averred, is to impose restrictions on the carrying on of any activity in the protected area which would impair Environment and Wild Life. It is averred that the express and avowed intendment and effect of the notification of the area as a reserved forest is that- no mining activity shall be permitted in the protected area. It is, accordingly, further contended that any mining activity in the area would also be inconsistent with and impermissible under the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980 and that even under the relevant mining laws any grant of mining privileges in the area would be bad.

(3.) The petitioners allege that despite these notifications and the clear mandate against carrying on of mining operations in this Protected Area both units core and buffer zones, Government of Rajasthan has, illegally and arbitrarily, issued about 400 mining privileges to various persons enabling them to carry on mining operations of lime and dolomite stones inside the protected area and that consequently deep-cast mines are operated to extract Marble by blasting, drilling, chiselling etc. which in the very process of their execution and the deep scars on the landscape they leave behind tend to degrade and diminish the ecology of the area, besides constituting a threat to the habitat of Wild Life. The petitioners rely upon the reports of environmental researchers of the Indian Institute of Public Administration, New Delhi in this behalf. Petitioners, accordingly, seek an interlocutory interdiction of the mining operations in the protected area durin g the pendency of this writ petition.