Punjab under pressure to notify eco-sensitive zone

Ramkrishan Upadhyay

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, November 6

The decision of the Supreme court to scrap the Tata Camelot high-rise township project has put pressure on the Punjab Government to notify the area around the Sukhna Wildlife Sanctuary under its jurisdiction as an eco-sensitive zone.

Punjab has been delaying the notification for the past five years. While the Ministry for Environment, Forests and Climate Change had notified an area of 1,050 hectares, 2 km to 2.75 km from the boundary of the Sukhna Wildlife Sanctuary in the UT, as an eco-sensitive zone in 2017, Punjab and Haryana have been delaying the notification pertaining to their areas since then.

The UT Administration has decided to raise the issue regarding the issuance of the notification soon with Punjab, Haryana and the Centre.

An officer of the Administration said as per the order of the Supreme Court, the states concerned would have to notify the area around the wildlife sanctuary falling in their areas as an eco-sensitive zone.

He said while the Haryana Government had stated that it had started the process to declare the area an eco-sensitive zone, the Punjab Government was yet to respond to the communication sent by the ministry. Punjab had sent a proposal to to keep the buffer zone within 100 metres from the Sukhna Wildlife Sanctuary, but the ministry had not accepted it and directions were issued to resubmit a proposal for at least a 1-km buffer zone.

The apex court also mentioned the delay in the judgment saying that “It was incumbent upon the state of Punjab to send a proposal to the Ministry of Environment and Forests, as required, but it appears it has not chosen to do so.”

Sources said the UT Administration would soon write to the Government of India  and the Punjab Government to notify the area as an eco-sensitize zone to protect wildlife. The UT Administration had opposed the approval given to the Tata Camelot high-rise township project by the Punjab Government since the project started.

Sumit kaur, a former Chief Architect, said  a former Governor, Gen SF  Rodrigues,  and then Adviser  and Finance  Secretary Sanjay Kumar  had all   united to  save the  city and had opposed the   project  since  its inception. 

Builders’ hopes dashed, 

The SC judgment in the Tata Camelot case has come as a relief for Chandigarh, but huge chunks of land have already been purchased by builders/colonisers in the area  and they were waiting for the result of the litigation by Tata Camelot.

The intention was clear that once the  Tata  project clears the judicial scrutiny, others would also float smaller projects in and around the Camelot project. Many had their projects ready, including brochures, and were expecting approval for the Tata project.

Ajay Jagga, an advocate,  said permission to the Tata project would have meant that others would have invoked Article 14 of the Constitution (right to equality) by seeking similar permissions for smaller projects. Besides, people had also been raising queries on the Internet on portals such as 99acres.com asking for the status of  the Tata Camelot project in order to make further investments. As such, the permission to the Tata project would have damaged Chandigarh “beyond imagination and repair”.