National Green Tribunal (NGT) (Critical Analysis)

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 The National Green Tribunal (NGT) is a statutory and quasi-judicial body established for effective and expeditious disposal of cases that are related to the protection and conservation of the environment, forests, and other natural resources. It aims to give relief and compensation for any damages caused to persons and properties. An order/decision/award of Tribunal is executable as a decree of a civil court.

The Achievements of the NGT are:

• Speedy justice in environmental matters: Since it began operations in July 2011, the NGT has heard 32,626 cases, of which 29,760 have been disposed of till May, 2020.
• Strengthening the concept of environmental justice in India: Over the years, the NGT has emerged as a vital player in environmental regulation, passing strict orders on issues including pollution, deforestation, waste management, protection of the rights of tribal communities etc.
• For example, the NGT, in 2017, imposed an intervening time ban on plastic bags of less than 50-micron thickness in Delhi.

• Incorporation of technical aspects in judgments: The NGT has employed legal and scientific methods and has assessed environment impact assessment reports before deciding on cases.
• New set of legal practitioners: The NGT has created a new breed of legal practitioners with expertise in environmental laws.

Despite its achievements, Challenges associated with its functioning :

• Lack of institutional mechanism: There is no specific mechanism to ensure compliance of its orders or to re-work its orders if found infeasible to implement.
• Most of the landmark orders of the NGT related to Ganga water pollution, Delhi air pollution, illegal mining, and solid waste management remain unenforced.
• Generic orders: Since July 2018, the Tribunal has disposed of over 700 cases, all at different stages of hearing, while directing the concerned authorities “to look into the matter and take appropriate action in accordance with law”.
• Large number of dismissals: Since 2018, the NGT dismissed many appeals filed before it, most of them on procedural grounds.
• Restricted jurisdiction: Two important legislations i.e. Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972 and Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006 have been kept out of NGT’s jurisdiction.
• Obstacle to development: Decisions of the NGT have been criticized and challenged due to their repercussions on economic growth.
• Vacancies: The NGT has only three judicial and three expert members against the sanctioned strength of ten each. This forces the Tribunal to outsource most of its technical work and constitute external committees to look into various aspects of cases.

Therefore, amendments should be made to the NGT Act to give powers to the Tribunal to follow up on its directions and to widen its scope for effective protection of the environment, while maintaining the balance with developmental activities. There is need for more autonomy and widen NGT’s scope for effective protection of environment in balance with human developmental activities. In its next decade, the NGT must continue to remain a proactive ‘inconvenience’ to all those who, while pontificating grandiloquently on the need for environmental protection, take actions that make economic growth ecologically unsustainable.