SUDARSHAN Vs. STATE ENVIRONMENT IMPACT ASSESSMENT AUTHORITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Since similar issues arise in these two writ petitions, they are disposed of by a common judgment. The petitioner is proposing to conduct a granite building stone quarry in an extent of 0.9307 hectares of land comprised in Survey Nos.463/5-4, 468/3-1 and 468/4-1 of Thirumarady Village in Muvattupuzha Taluk. Ext.P1 is the letter of intent dtd. 17/7/2018 issued in favour of the petitioner. The petitioner has obtained approval for the mining plan in respect of the area covered by Ext.P1. Ext.P3 is the survey map of the area. The petitioner has applied for Environmental Clearance to the respondents 1 and 2. Since the District Authority is no longer functioning, Environmental Clearance has to be issued by the 1st respondent.

(2.) Ext.P5 is the Environmental Impact Assessment (Amendment) notification dtd. 1/7/2016 whereby conditions regarding cluster were made applicable. As per Ext.P5, paragraph No.6 Appendix XI was substituted as follows:

(3.) A note is seen added which relates to the mining of minor minerals in the State of Rajasthan which is indicative of the manner in which a cluster is formed. As reason for the amendment in Ext.P5 cites the example in the State of Rajasthan where leases which had been granted several years before have been fragmented due to family partitions resulting in mines being located adjacent to each other leaving no spaces between two leases, making it difficult to prepare and implement environmental management plan for individual leases. The petitioner has been issued with Ext.P6 cluster certificate by the District Geologist. Ext.P6 shows that there were four other leases in the area of which the lease granted to one Smt.Bindu P.A alone was working. The other three leases were non-working mines. The lease to Smt.Bindu P.A is the one for which Environmental Clearance was granted as per Ext.P9 on 25/10/2017. The said Environmental Clearance was issued after the implementation of the cluster requirement. It can be seen from Ext.P8 that the other leases in the names of Sri.Joseph O.S, Sri.George Chumar and Sri.T.K.Joseph had expired on 25/9/2018, 11/6/2015 and 30/3/2018 respectively. It is thus evident that when Ext.P9 was issued in favour of Smt.Bindu.P.A, the leases in favour of Sri.Joseph O.S and Sri.T.K.Joseph were working leases. It can be seen from Ext.P9 that there was no insistence on the cluster Rule while granting the clearance to Smt.Bindu.P.A.