Supreme Court quashes Uttarakhand High Court order allowing construction in Jilling Estate

The Supreme Court recently quashed an Uttarakhand High Court order that allowed some construction activities in Jilling Estate at Uttarkhand [Birendra Singh vs Union of India and ors]..A bench of Justices BR Gavai and Sandeep Mehta on January 2 noted that allowing the construction while the High Court is yet to finally dispose of a plea against such construction could result in a situation that cannot be reversed or a fait accompli. .The top court, therefore, restored an earlier order staying all construction in the area and asked the High Court to decide the matter preferably within three months."Particularly taking into consideration that the matter also involves environmental issues, we quash and set aside the impugned order," the Supreme Court stated..The High Court had earlier modified a November 2022 interim order that had stayed all construction activities in the area owing to the depleting green cover as visible on Google Maps.In the 2022 order, a bench of Chief Justice Vipin Sanghi and Justice RC Khulbe had taken into consideration three Google Maps pictures from the years 2015, 2018 and 2022 before directing that construction be halted in Jilling Estate. The 2022 interim order was modified by the High Court in September 2023 to permit certain construction in the area, provided certain conditions to limit the environmental damage were adhered to. This 2023 order has now been set aside by the Supreme Court. .By way of background, in 2018, an application was filed by petitioner Birendra Singh before the National Green Tribunal (NGT).He had contended that a township was being planned at the Jilling Estate, with huge concrete constructions, villas, swimming pool, solar electric fencing, a private helipad, etc., all of which would damage the ecology and hinder free movement of wildlife. The petitioner also raised concern that these activities would be carried out without an environmental clearance.The application was dismissed by the NGT after relying on reports submitted by the Court Commissioner. Consequently, an appeal was filed before the Supreme Court in 2020 against the NGT order.The Supreme Court disposed of that appeal by directing authorities to conduct a survey and demarcation within a period of eight weeks in respect of the area falling in three patches of the Jilling estate, wherein the density of forest appeared to be 40 percent or more.The Court Commissioner found that about 8.5 hectares out of the entire Estate, i.e. 36 hectares, constituting Jilling Estate, appeared to have high density of forest cover.The Supreme Court had directed the demarcation exercise to determine, whether the area could be classified as 'Deemed Forest' in terms of the judgment passed by the Supreme Court in TN Godavarman vs. Union of India.In November 2022, the High Court found that this demarcation exercise was yet to be carried out. Therefore, it ordered a fresh inspection of the area and also stayed any construction at the Jilling Estate. However, in September 2023, it allowed partial construction towards the 90-acre luxury township project, leading to the instant appeal before the top court..The appeal was disposed of on January 2 after the Supreme Court restored the 2022 order staying construction at the Jilling Estate. .Before the apex court, the petitioner was represented by advocates PB Suresh, Vipin Nair, and Karthik Jayashankar. The project proponents were represented by Senior Advocate CU Singh and advocate Sushil Salwan..[Read order]