A Supreme Court judge has pointed at the “painful distance between law on paper and life on the ground” when it comes to environment at a recent meeting attended by judges from the Supreme Court, High Courts, the National Green Tribunals (NGT) and senior officials.
Speaking last Saturday at the Regional Conference on Environment, co-organised by the National Green Tribunal (NGT) in Chennai, Justice Aravind Kumar, in his speech as Special Guest, dwelled on the areas in which this gap is starkly evident. Several green activists and legal professionals echoed this view while speaking to The Plurals.
The two-day conference was organised by the NGT Southern Zone Bench and the Southern State Pollution Control Boards to address urgent ecological challenges facing the region.
Environment damage unchecked
“We must be honest. There is often a painful distance between law on paper and life on the ground,” said the Supreme Court judge. “We have detailed regulations for environmental clearances for solid and biomedical waste, for coastal zone protection; we have robust case laws that repeatedly uphold that the environment is an essential facet of the right to life. The National Green Tribunal itself is a specialised body created to give teeth to these commitments.”
The judge stressed that despite all these legal protections, damage to the environment continues unchecked. This could perhaps be read as a comment on the ineffectiveness of the current enviro-legal discourse.
“Yet we see hills…flattening in the name of development, sometimes with scant regard to carrying capacity. We still see rivers treated as convenient drains, rather than living ecosystems. We still see solid waste mountains growing on the outskirts of the cities that pride themselves on being very smart. We still see coastlines where mangroves are replaced by concrete and fishermen displaced by poorly-paid projects,” Kumar, who was Chief Justice of Gujarat High Court previously, added.
Kumar referred to Article 21, Article 48A and Article 51 A (g) of the Indian Constitution to talk about the fundamental nature of environmental rights. Article 21 tells us about the “right to live with dignity in a clean and healthy environment. Articles 48A and 51 AG remind us that protecting and improving the environment is not the hobby of a few nature lovers but is the duty of the state and every citizen,” he said.
“The gap between the intention and the outcome is not merely an administrative gap. It is also a cultural gap. We have learnt to treat environmental compliances as an obstacle to be overcome instead of a discipline to be honoured,” he further said.
Other judges, present at the meeting, also referred to several other environmental violations in national and international perspectives.
While Supreme Court judge M.M. Sundresh mentioned about the dyeing industry pollution and coastal impacts, Manindra Mohan Shrivastava, Chief Justice of Madras High Court, spoke about the global decline in wildlife populations.
Violators have a free run
Biswajit Mukherjee, a retired chief law officer of West Bengal Pollution Control Board and a national award winner for his contribution to the cause of environment, underlined that the legal action on environment violators has been diluted in recent times.
“Earlier, in the 90s and even in the early 2000s, we saw how both the Supreme Court and High Courts were proactive on environment matters, but in recent times we do not see that trend,” observed Mukherjee.
The former state government official pointed out the recent reversal of a Supreme Court order regarding environmental violation as an example.
“In May 2025, a Supreme Court bench dismissed the provision of the post-facto environmental approval of any project, brought by Union environment, forest and climate change ministry, because it challenges the basic tenet of the Environment Protection Act that makes it mandatory to take the environment clearance before the project rolls out. However, within six months, another Supreme Court bench upturned the order and allowed post-facto approvals. This is clearly a major deterrent in the effort to save environment,” Mukherjee added.
Subhas Datta, an environment activist who has pleaded an exceptionally high number of cases as a non-lawyer, concurred. “First, environment violation-related cases in different courts hardly come up for hearing; and second, even if they come up and orders are issued, seldom do they get implemented,” said Datta. He had earlier written to the judiciary complaining that green cases are often put on the back burner.
Records show that as of October 31, 2025, 5301 cases were pending in several National Green Tribunals in the country, which were set up to provide speedy disposal of environment-related cases.
While the number, marginally more than 10 per cent of overall number of cases — 52,450 — filed in green tribunals across the country so far, indicates a much better disposal rate compared to other judicial forums across the country; the ‘ on ground’ implementation of their orders remains under the scanner.
“With an administration often hand in gloves with environment violators and a judicial system that is generally much less active compared to earlier, the violators have a free run now. Be it illegal buildings coming up filling water bodies, or trees being mercilessly cut in the name of development, or illegal sand mining in rivers happening in clear daylight, environmental violation has almost become the norm across the country,” opined Naba Datta, an environment activist from West Bengal.
“The judicial delay in adjudicating environmental matters further makes the situation tougher for people seeking justice. Justice delayed is justice denied, particularly in the matters of the environment. What’s the point in hearing a water body filling case once it gets filled up, or hearing a noise pollution case year after year despite the norms getting brazenly violated during every Diwali?” the activist demanded.