NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday stayed National Green Tribunal (NGT) order of constituting a panel under Delhi Lieutenant-Governor V K Saxena to head high-level committee on Yamuna river pollution.
A bench of CJI DY Chandrachud, Justices PS Narasimha and Manoj Mishra also issued notice in the plea. “There shall be a stay of the operation on the direction of NGT to the extent that the L-G has been asked to be the head,” the bench said in the order.
The Yamuna panel was created by the NGT on January 9 while it was dealing with a petition highlighting the increasing pollution in Yamuna and the failure of authorities to take remedial measures. The five-member bench in its order noted, “Having multiple authorities in Delhi may be one of the reasons for not achieving success so far. There appears to be a lack of ownership and accountability.”
Challenging the NGT’s order, the Delhi govt had argued before SC that it had amounted to sidelining the elected government through an unelected figurehead who was bound to act on the advice of the council of ministers.
“It is submitted that the issues concerning the present appeal are within the domain of the legislative powers conferred upon the Legislative Assembly and do not fall within any exception as laid down in the Constitution. In light of the above-settled position of law, affirmed most recently by this Court in Civil Appeal 2357 of 2017, the order of NGT is legally not tenable,” the petition said.
It said steps suggested by the NGT such as using treated water for agriculture, horticulture or industrial purposes, preventing discharge/dumping of any waste, protecting flood plain zones, etc are all which require budgetary allocations that are cleared by the Legislative Assembly.
