Don't reduce forest land without giving compensatory land: Supreme Court to Centre, States

In an order of significant import, the Supreme Court on February 3 directed that the Central government or States shall not do anything which will lead to reduction of forest land unless compensatory land is provided either by the State or the Union of India for the purpose of afforestation [Ashok Kumar Sharma, Indian Forest Service (Retd) & Ors. Vs Union Of India & Anr]..The direction was passed by a Bench of Justice BR Gavai and Justice K Vinod Chandran while hearing a batch of petitions challenging the constitutional validity of the Forest Conservation Amendment Act of 2023.“We make it clear that until further orders, no steps will be taken by the Union of India or any of the States, which will lead to reduction of the forest land unless a compensatory land is provided either by the State Government or the Union of India for the purpose of afforestation,” the Court directed. .The petitioners moved the Court contending that the Forest (Conservation) Amendment Act, 2023 effectively dilutes the definition of 'forest' as defined by the apex court in a 1996 judgment in TN Godavarman v. Union of India. As per this judgment, the dictionary meaning of forest is also included in the definition of forest in the Act, it was pointed out.However, the Amendment Act would restrict the definition of "forest" and vast tracts of forest lands that were previously protected would now stand excluded..The petitioners highlighted that diversion of forest land for linear projects, public utility projects and security projects. Even forest lands situated 100 kms along the entire border of India have been exempt from the ambit of "forest" in the Amendment Act.It was also pointed out that the Amendment Act legalises the use of unclassed forests for compensatory afforestation compliance, which is not in consonance with the National Forest Policy 1988..Van (Samrakshan Evam Samvardhan) Rules 2023 enacted after the Amendment Act provides that application for diversion of forest land will be decided by the Forest Department of the State itself, which makes junior officers vulnerable to coercion and political and other pressures, it was contended. .Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati, appearing for the Central government, previously submitted before Court that the purpose of introducing the amendment was not to constrict the definition of “forest” as adopted by this Court but to implement the decision in T N Godavarman.On February 3, she said that she will place a status report before the Court by the next date of hearing. .The matter will be heard next on March 4..Advocates for Petitioners Senior Advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan with advocates Satyajit Sarna, Advocate on Record (AOR) Prashant Padmanabhan, Sudev Juneja, Vishal Sinha.Senior Advocate Prashanto Chandra Sen, AOR Kaushik Choudhury, Advocates Shibani Ghosh, Saksham Garg and Jyotirmoy Chatterjee.Senior Advocate Anitha Shenoy, AOR Srishti Agnihotri with Advocates Ayushma Awasthi, Himanshi Gupta, Sanjana Grace Thomas and Shreepurna Dasgupta.Senior Advocate Shyam Divan, AOR Madhusmita Bora, Advocate Dipankar Singh.Advocate on Record Prashant Bhushan with Advocates Neha Rathi, Kamal Kishore, Kajal Giri Advocate on Record R. C. Kaushik, Advocates Balraj Singh Malik, Tannu, Bano DeswalAdvocates for RespondentsAdditional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati, AOR Gurmeet Singh Makker, Advocates Ruchi Kohli, Bani Dixit, Rajat Nair, Sridhar Pottaraju, Kanu Agarwal, Umesh Babu Chourasia, AOR Dr. N. Visakamurthy, AOR Abhimanyu Tewari, Eliza Bar, AOR Debojit Borkakati, AOR Pukhrambam Ramesh Kumar, Advocates Karun Sharma, Anupama Ngangom, Rajkumari Divyasana.AOR Tejaswi Kumar Pradhan, Pranab Samantray, Manoranjan Paikaray, AOR Prakash Ranjan Nayak, Debasis Jena, AOR Abhishek Atrey, Dr. Abhishek Atrey, Ishita Bist, Ambika Atrey, Jyoti Verma, Navneet Gupta, AOR Nishe Rajen Shonker, Anu K Joy, Alim Anvar, Santhosh K.AOR Naveen Kumar, Advocates Aprajita Bhardwaj, Shourajeet Chakravarty, Nitesh Bhandari, Stuti Bisht, Prabhat Kumar Rai, Maitreya, Aditya Goyal, Ujjawal Kumar Rai, Esha Kumar, Nidhi Singh, Utkarsh ChandraSenior Advocate PP Hegde, AOR Anantha Narayana, AOR Atul Shankar Vinod, Advocates Dileep Pillai, Kannan Gopal Vinod, K. Enatoli Sema, Limayinla Jamir, Amit Kumar Singh, Chubalemla Chang, Prang Newmai..[Read Order]