The Delhi High Court has extended the time till August 11 for giving suggestions to draft Environment Impact Assessment notification, 2020, providing post facto approval to various projects while doing away with public consultation.
A bench of Chief Justice D N And Prateek Jalan questioned the Union government questioned the "obstinacy" of the Centre to remove the ambiguity with regard to the notification published on April 11.
The court said the process for public consultation was not an obstacle and the response from the Union government has been conspicuously silent on the issue.
It said no effort has been made to address its query.
According to a writ petition filed by Vikrant Tongad, as per the notification, published on April 11, the last date for submission of the objections on the draft Environmental Impact Assessment notification was June 11, 2020.
By another notification on May 8, the last date has been extended by further 60 days.
However, there was a typographical error in the said notification of May 8, as the last date for filing objections has been mentioned as June 30, which ought to have been August 11, 2020.
Tongad asked the court to extend the date to September 30 or till the time Covid-19 lockdown was in force.
(Published 30 June 2020, 06:21 IST)
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