Environment First! Bombay HC Annuls Clearances to Coastal Road Project

Mumbai, July 16: In a battle between environment and development, the Bombay High Court today favoured the environment. The HC today quashed the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) clearances granted to BMC’s 14000-crore rupees Coastal Road Project which is proposed to connect Marine Drive to Borivali. 

 

The Coastal Road is an under-construction 8-lane, around 30km long freeway that would run along Mumbai’s western coastline. A bunch of petitions were filed by activists, residents and fishermen from the city challenging the project claiming that the project would irreversibly damage the coastal ecosystem and deprive the fishing community in the city of its source of livelihood. The petitioners include Shweta Wagh, Worli Fishermen, Conservation Action Trust, Vanashakti, Society for Improvement, Greenery and Nature, etc. 

Senior Advocate Janak Dwarakadas, who appears for the petitioners, argued that the project still lacks several clearances and permissions from the central as well as the State government. He also pointed out that the recommendations made by Environmental Assessment Committee were cleared within a day. 

 

The High Court in April prohibited the BMC from carrying out any further work on the project following which the corporation appealed in the Supreme Court. In May, the Supreme Court permitted the corporation to carry out the existing work, but prohibited it from doing any new work. The apex court then directed the high court to take up the petitions for final hearing. Today, a division bench of Chief Justice Pradeep Nadrajog and Justice N. M. Jamdar quashed the CRZ clearances.

“it is common sense that where there are coral reefs, they need stagnant water. You are causing fairly irreversible damage to that part of the coast,” the bench had said earlier last month at the hearing.