After giving a free hand for quick clearance of Defence lands for strategic road building in border areas, the Government wants the States to form a board to initiate quick environment and forest clearances at their level for upto 100 km road stretches in border areas.
In a written communication to Ministry of Environment and Forests, the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has asked it to empower States with International Borders to give environment and forest clearances at their level to speed up infrastructure projects along the borders.
The MoRTH has requested the Environment Ministry to allow States to form separate cells for initiating forest and environment clearances for projects upto 100 km at their level and refer big projects to the Centre.
Bihar, West Bengal, Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Uttar Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Rajasthan, Punjab and Gujarat are the States having international borders.
“The environment clearances from the Centre take a long time and the backlog keeps increasing. Moreover, it is a long process, as the Centre has to send teams to the State to study the situation and then start the clearance process. It is very expensive and time consuming,” said an official from the Ministry of Road and Highways.
“The roads on border areas are high priority for the Government. The Centre wants to empower States with the decision to provide environment and forest clearances. We are positive this should come through,” he said. This move, if comes through, will help clear the existing backlog of environment and forest clearances at the Centre.
The Ministry also proposes to discuss big ticket projects awaiting or stuck for clearances at the monthly inter-Ministry meeting to discuss infrastructure projects. The infrastructure committee was formed by the new Government to closely monitor and fast track infrastructure projects across Ministries — Roads, Railways, Shipping, Defence and Environment — to help ease bottlenecks slowing the projects.