Mon May 19 09:09:57 UTC 2025: **Headline: Supreme Court Strikes Down Retroactive Environmental Clearances, Congress Leader Calls it “Damning Indictment” of Modi Government**
**New Delhi – May 19, 2025** – The Supreme Court of India has delivered a significant blow to the central government’s environmental policies, striking down measures that allowed for retroactive environmental clearances for projects that violated environmental norms. The ruling, issued on Friday, May 16, 2025, was hailed by Congress leader Jairam Ramesh as a “damning indictment” of the Modi government’s environmental record.
The court stated that the right to a pollution-free environment is a fundamental right and that the government, like its citizens, has a constitutional obligation to protect it. The ruling came in response to a plea filed by the Vanashakti organization.
The court specifically targeted a 2017 notification and a 2021 office memorandum, finding that they were designed to shield violators who had knowingly bypassed the requirement for prior environmental clearance under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986. The court asserted that these measures violated established legal precedents, encouraged pollution, and legitimized the degradation of air and water quality, thus infringing upon the fundamental right to a clean environment guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution.
“It is not possible to understand why the Central Government made efforts to protect those who committed illegality by not obtaining prior EC in terms of the EIA notification,” the court stated.
Mr. Ramesh, a former Environment Minister, claimed that the judgement exposed a contradiction between the Modi government’s international rhetoric on environmental protection and its actions at home. “This ruling reaffirms the principles and practices of sustainable development and declares such clearances illogical and illegal,” he said.
The court restrained the Centre from issuing directions for granting ex post facto clearances in any form or manner, effectively preventing the regularization of actions that contravene the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) notification. The ruling is expected to have significant implications for ongoing and future development projects across the country.
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