Compensatory Afforestation Fund Bill – A Potential Solution For A Potent Problem

Author: Abhishek Chansoria, (2nd Year student of IIT Kharagpur Law School)

Amid the chaotic and inefficient Parliament’s monsoon session, some key legislation could not see the light of the day. Shadowed under the highly debated GST Bill or the Land Acquisition Bill was the Compensatory Afforestation Fund Bill, 2015.

The Hon'ble Supreme Court in its order in GodavarmanThirumulpad v. Union of India [Writ Petition (C) No. 202 of 1995], dated 30th October, 2002, observed that a Compensatory Afforestation Fund may be created in which all the monies received from the user agencies shall be deposited which shall be utilized for plantations, protection of forests, wildlife protection and other related activities.

Source: wikimedia.org (labeled for reuse)

By introducing additional compensatory afforestation on the parties using the diverted forest land for non-forest use under the Forest (Conservation) Act, the bill envisages to create a mechanism to give tangible compensation to the forest cover and the nature.

Interestingly, a temporary structure created by the Supreme Court namely the ad hoc Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) has an unspent amount of more than Rs. 3,80,00,00,00,000/- (Thirty Eight Thousand Crores).

With the provisions for constitution of two authorities, at the National and State level, the Bill seems very promising. The National CAMPA consists of an Executive Committee and a Monitoring Group and the State CAMPA would have a Steering Committee and an Executive Committee. The most effective part of the whole act seems to be the constitution of these committees which is done under Section 8, 9, 10 and 11 of the Bill. With the emanation of the environmental jurisprudence in India, several authorities have been constituted. The above-referred sections name heads of various authorities, initiatives and started by the Government along with the inclusion of environmentalists and NGOs.

The Bill delegates the powers to make rules regarding the investment of the monies in the Fund to the National and State Authority along with the provisions for audit by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India.

The Bill recognizes it to be a key authority which is reflected by its constitution. The provisions for striving for working with transparency and accountability are included in the Bill.

As it has not yet passed by the Parliament, some of the issues which are prima facie evident in the Bill could be addressed for avoiding future ambiguity.

One of the issues which are not included in the Bill is the jurisdiction of the courts in the matter of disputes. The investments might also include the investments in more than one state. Disputes arising out of these arrangements logically seem to be addressed under Article 131 of the Constitution but whether the National Green Tribunal should have any say in these or any other disputes is yet to be answered under the legislation.

Another key issue is the procedure for disqualification and the nature of enquiry which should be followed. The Bill does talk about who would be disqualified to be a member of any of the two authorities but the procedure of determining the same is yet to be formulated.

This is a key piece of legislation which has taken another step towards environmental protection by including affirmative and compensatory actions. The Supreme Court has done a commendable job by taking up this issue and giving necessary guidelines which have been well reflected in the proposed Bill. Only if good intentions could lead to good governance, hence, proper execution of the Bill is important. It could either be another one of the Act which only has ‘environment protection’ in its objectives or could be a reason for a watershed event to finally address the issue substantially.

Disclaimer: This blog or any post thereof is not to be considered to be in any way associated with the official stand of IIT kharagpur or RGSOIPL on the issues being discussed in the said post. The opinions on the blog are the authors own and should not be considered as legal advice.

Read More

Weekly Legal Updates

Here we are... to begin this new session. We start with the updates from last week. 

The Supreme Court in a recent judgment has ruled that CCTV cameras should be installed in the prisons within one year and not later than that. The court has also suggested that all lock-ups in the country should have CCTV cameras installed as per the satisfaction of the police commissioner/DGP concerned. This was, however, left to the discretion of the respective states and union territories. The Supreme Court has also said that every police station should have at least two women constables to deal with women who are accused or suspects.

The Supreme Court came down heavily on the Central Government for not filing a counter affidavit in a petition questioning the functioning of the Juvenile Justice Boards (JJBs) across the country. The Social justice bench of the Apex Court, while imposing Rs.25,000 cost on the Ministry of Women and Child Development remarked “You are not even bothered to file your affidavit. You will have to pay the cost”. The bench, was hearing a Public Interest Litigation seeking proper implementation of Juvenile Justice Act and its rules. The Court had sought complete details on the pendency of cases, frequency of its sittings, vacancy of posts and other related issues.

The Bombay High Court has denied the relief under Protection of Women from Domestic Violence (DV) Act to a woman who was living with a married man for 15 years. The Additional Sessions Judge had ruled that the woman was in a “live-in relationship” with the married man and was entitled to relief under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence (DV) Act. The Court observed that since they had been in a relationship for almost 15 years, common sense required that she should have made enquiries about his marital status. The Court also noted that the woman had not been able to give a single instance where they had appeared as husband and wife in the society on any occasion of marriage or party. The Court hence ruled that such a relationship cannot be relationship in the nature of marriage. She and her daughters were therefore, not entitled for any relief under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005.  The Court however noted that the daughters may be entitled for relief under Section 125 of the Code of Criminal procedure.

A PIL has been filed in the Supreme Court challenging the appointment of Mr. K.V. Chaudhary as the Central Vigilance Commissioner and Mr. T.M. Bhasin as the Vigilance Commissioner as being “illegal and arbitrary”. The petitioners have claimed that there was complete non transparency on the part of the Central Government in making the appointment of the CVC and VC. The Petitioners have also claimed that the appointments violate the principles of ‘impeccable integrity’ and ‘institutional integrity’ laid down in the landmark judgments of Vineet Narain case (1998) 1 SCC 226 and Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL) case (2011) 4 SCC 1.

Yakub Memon, convicted in the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts, has approached the Supreme Court challenging the death warrant for his execution scheduled on July 30. According to his plea the death warrant is illegal because it did not follow the proper procedure prescribed by the Supreme Court in Shatrughan Chauhan & Anr. v. Union of India & Ors.

The Supreme Court of India in a ruling (DM Wayanad Institute of Medical Sciences vs. Union of India and Another – Writ Petition (C) No. 441 Of 2015) has reaffirmed the settled legal position that under Article 32 it will not interfere with an administrative order where the constitutionality of the statute or the order made there under has not been challenged on the ground of contravention of Fundamental Rights. The Apex Court added that no question other than that relating to the Fundamental Rights will be determined in a proceeding under Article 32 of the Constitution.

The SC has dismissed a Public Interest Litigation that came up before the three Judges Bench praying “to stop the use of names and images of gods and goddesses for commercial exploitation”.  The court dismissed the petition remarking that “You have raised the issue which concerns the faith of the people. This country has 33,000 crore gods. Sorry.”

We hope that this summarizes the last week's News. Your comments and suggestions are welcomed.

Until next post of weekly News updates.

Anjana Srinivasan, (3rd Year student of IIT Kharagpur Law School)

For 'OFF Court.'

Disclaimer: This blog or any post thereof is not to be considered to be in any way associated with the official stand of IIT kharagpur or RGSOIPL on the issues being discussed in the said post. The opinions on the blog are the authors own and should not be considered as legal advice.

Read More

Happy B'day: OFF Court

Hi Friends!!

On 24th January 2014, four students (Antriksh Mishra, Tanveer Verma, Suraj Badrayan and Myself) of IIT-Kharagpur Law School started this blog with a simple goal to set a platform that can bring out the writing skills of the students of our School. It has been a year since then and we have been extremely excited with the support and encouragements from our friends, seniors, juniors, alumni and faculty members. We have received appreciations, criticisms, suggestions and enthusiasm from the RG family. We are thankful to all for helping us evolve.

I thank all the formal members of blog team from current 1st year and 2nd year. I specially thank our immediate senior batch for their contributions as posts and their valued time in editing, apart from their moral support. I thank RG-2015 batch students, this blog has found tremendous support, contributions and encouragement from  this batch. I thank specially some of close friends form RG-2015 who have provided technical and moral support to us.

Finally, I am thanking the other three.. Antriksh, Tanveer and Suraj. Words can't express my gratefulness towards you guys!!

The management of the blog is transferred to the next batch (RG-2016). It is now going from all 'Boy's Team' to all 'Girl's Team'. We wish Smriti Sanjgotra, Shweta Khurana and Anjana Srinivasan, the very best and hope that they will do their great.

Thanks & Regards!

Best Wishes!!!

Manish Kumar

On behalf of 'Founding Members' of 'OFF Court'.

Read More

Weekly Legal Updates

We bring you the updates for last week. Hope it updates you with all the news from legal world.

Updates: 03th January to 11th January 2015:
In a major move the Supreme Court has revised rules regarding its selection of judicial clerks which allows non-NLU students to apply.  The new rules, published on the Supreme Court’s website, specifies that applicants can come from any law college accredited by the Bar Council of India (BCI).

The President of India  promulgated the Citizenship (Amendment) Ordinance, 2015 on January 06, 2015 with immediate effect which provides for the following amendments to the Indian Citizen Act, 1955:

• At present one year continuous stay in India is mandatory for Indian Citizenship which is relaxed stating that if the Central Government is satisfied that special circumstances exist, it may, after recording such circumstances in writing, relax the period of twelve months specified upto a maximum of thirty days which may be in different breaks.

• To enable for registration as Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) by a minor, whose parents are Indian Citizens.

• To enable for registration as Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) by a child or a grand-child or a great grandchild of such a citizen.

• To enable for registration as Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) by such spouse of a citizen of India or spouse of an OCI registered under Section 7A and whose marriage has been registered and subsisted for a continuous period of not less than two years immediately preceding the presentation of the application under this section.

• In respect of existing PIO card holders central government may, by notification in Official Gazette, specify a particular date from which all existing PIO card holders will be deemed to be OCI card holders.

The Delhi High court dismissed a plea against Amir Khan starrer movie- PK, holding that there was no substance in the allegations leveled against the movie, in the PIL filed by Ajay Gautam. The Court also observed that the provision for appeal against the CBFC’s decision on certification of films was restricted to film-makers. Mr. Gautam had alleged that the movie defamed and maligned the Hindu religion and culture. It was also contended that the movie hurt the religious sentiments of Hindus.

In a submission made before the Apex Court, the Central Government has said that it wants to stop NGOs that do not submit their balance sheets of last three years. The Central Government represented by the Additional Solicitor General P S Patwalia submitted to the Bench headed by Chief Justice of India HL Dattu that the submission of balance sheets by the NGOs must be a condition precedent for grant of funds.

The Supreme Court has published the in-house mechanism adopted by it in 1999 to deal with complaints against the judges of the Supreme Court and High Court in its website. This has been published pursuant to its judgment in the sexual harassment case involving a sitting judge of the Madhya Pradesh High Court. In the above judgment the Court relied on the in-house mechanism and had scrapped the investigation initiated by the Madhya Pradesh Chief Justice on the ground that it was not in compliance with the in-house mechanism.

Siemens, Dong Energy and London Array – the world's biggest operating offshore wind farm – are all heading for a UK court showdown with German turbine-maker Enercon over alleged patent infringement of 'Storm Control' technology developed by the latter's founder, Aloys Wobben. The Wobben Properties lawsuit names Siemens, Dong and turbine-installation specialist A2Sea as defendants.  The 630MW London Array – which is already using 175 3.6MW Siemens turbines – is the subject of a similar but separate action, and is set to join the other defendants in contesting the case at a High Court hearing in London, currently scheduled for June. Enercon had previously successfully sued turbine OEM Gamesa in Spain over the 'storm control' patent, a verdict which is currently being appealed.

We hope that this summarizes the last week's News. Your comments and suggestions are welcomed.

Until next post of weekly News updates.

Anjana Srinivasan, (2nd Year student of IIT Kharagpur Law School)

For 'OFF Court.'

Disclaimer: This blog or any post thereof is not to be considered to be in any way associated with the official stand of IIT kharagpur or RGSOIPL on the issues being discussed in the said post. The opinions on the blog are the authors own and should not be considered as legal advice.

Read More