While every month a good number of wildlife-related projects are cleared with certain conditions that has to be followed by proponents while executing the proposal, strangely there is yet no mechanism in place to check if these are being followed in letter and spirit.
As a result, many project proponents seems to be having no qualms in blatantly ignoring the mitigation measures to minimise the adverse impact on wildlife they are supposed to follow once their projects are cleared. Now, waking up to this glaring gap, the Union Environment Ministry is mulling to set up a robust mechanism to ensure that project agencies strictly comply with the terms and conditions they are stipulated to follow during clearance of their proposals. Taking strict view in the matter, the Standing Committee of the NBWL chaired by Dr Harsh Vardhan has also decided that monitoring of the mitigative measures will be a part of the management effectiveness evaluation process conducted by the Wildlife Institute of India (WII).
The issue was highlighted by Dr HS Singh, member of the standing committee of the National Board of Wildlife (NBWL) in its meeting in January, this year.
Dr Singh complained that during the field visits by different committees constituted by the Standing Committee of NBWL, it was observed that many projects were implemented without implementing the conditions including mitigation measures.
“In other words, the interests of wildlife conservation were ignored sometimes intentionally,” said Dr Singh, said the minutes of the meeting.
The standing committee, which is headed by Dr Harshvardhan is entrusted with responsibility of giving green clearances to projects that pass through protected areas like tiger reserves, wildlife sanctuaries and also those falling within 10-kilometre distance of the wildlife sanctuary or national parks.
Dr Singh further mentioned that the conservationists were of the view that the Protected Areas (PAs) have suffered in recent times due to sanctioning of the developmental projects inside the PAs while the project proponents ignored the conditions specially mentioned for protection of wildlife while recommending the projects.
Stringent action needs to be taken against the project proponents who have not complied with the terms and conditions. Further, no new projects would be taken up from States where the terms and conditions are not complied, these are some of the stringent measures that are being considered to tighten the noose, as per the the minutes.
The Minister was of considered view that there is a need to establish a robust mechanism of monitoring to confirm the compliance of terms and conditions including the mitigation measures stipulated while recommending the proposals.
He also suggested that instead of 100 per cent monitoring of all the projects, certain representative projects could be taken up, through a well-defined, criteria for monitoring to see the compliance of terms and conditions on ground, as per the minutes.
NBWL is the highest body related to wildlife matters, and is headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. However, its work is handled by NBWL’s standing committee since the board does not meet regularly.