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The Supreme Court on Monday (September 7) held that a prior allotment or legal possession of land is not mandatory at the stage of submitting an application for granting an Environmental Clearance (EC) for the purpose of establishing a Common Bio-medical Waste Treatment Facility (CBWTF).

“Clause 6 of the EIA, 2006 states that an application in Form 1 can be made after the identification of prospective site(s). Therefore, land allotment cannot be said to be a pre-condition for the making of an application under Form 1.”, the Court said.

A bench of Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice Manoj Misra set aside the National Green Tribunal's decision to quash the environmental permissions granted to the Appellant-company for its proposed CBWTF facility in Uttar Pradesh's Sambhal District.

The principal issue before the Court was whether an applicant seeking an environment clearance for a CBWTF must have already acquired or been allotted the land before submitting the Form 1 application for the issue of Terms of Reference (“ToR”) to commence the Environmental Impact Assessment (“EIA”) study.

The Court answered this in the negative, explaining that the environmental clearance process involves different stages and that the requirement relating to land cannot be treated identically at every stage.

At the Form 1 stage, which is the screening stage, the applicant is required only to identify prospective sites for the proposed project. Actual allotment or legal possession of the land is not a mandatory precondition.

At the subsequent appraisal stage, however, the applicant must produce a credible document indicating the status of land acquisition. Such material may include an intention of the landowner to sell, provisional allotment or other evidence demonstrating progress towards securing the land.

The Court observed that legal possession through a sale deed or lease deed is not necessarily required either before filing Form 1 or at the appraisal stage.

“Clause 6 of the EIA, 2006 and the O.M. dated 07.10.2014 respectively clarify that legal possession by way of a sale deed, lease deed etc., may not necessarily be obtained, both before making the Form 1 application and at the stage of appraisal, respectively.”, the Court observed.

Further, the Court considered the aspect of the mandatory applicability the Revised Guidelines for Common Bio-medical Waste Treatment and Disposal Facilities, 2016 (RG, 2016) to the present case as it prescribes the land-area requirements for CBWTFs, including the general requirement of approximately one acre.

Since, the appellant had proposed to establish the facility on plots measuring 0.89 acres falling short of one-acre requirement under RG 2016, the NGT had set aside the environmental clearance and Consent to Establish (CTE).

Disagreeing with the NGT's approach, the judgment authored by Justice Pardiwala held that while compliance with RG, 2016 was mandatory, the guidelines themselves contemplated relaxation of the one-acre requirement in appropriate cases, particularly for facilities situated in rural areas.

“As per Clause 7 of the RG, 2016, the land requirement of one acre prescribed for setting up a CBWTF may be relaxed upon the fulfilment of one of the two pre-conditions i.e., the land must be situated either within municipal limits with a population of more than 25 lakh or within a rural area. Additionally, consultation with the CPCB and the imposition of additional control measures is mandatory. The appellant's CBWTF is located within Village Noorpur and is therefore, in a rural area. Relaxation was granted only after due consultation with the CPCB and the imposition of additional control measures which took into account the operational effectiveness of the CBWTF in a smaller area. Therefore, the grant of relaxation cannot be faulted.”, the Court said.

“…we have reached the conclusion that the NGT committed an egregious error in passing the impugned judgment quashing the second EC and second CTE respectively.”, the Court held.

As a result, the appeal was allowed.

“Registry shall forward one copy of this judgment to the National Green Tribunal, Principal Bench, New Delhi and the Principal Bench thereafter shall circulate the judgment to all the circuit benches of the Tribunal.”, the Court directed.

Cause Title: M/S PUNAHCHAKRAN PRIVATE LIMITED VERSUS INDOTECH WASTE SOLUTION & ORS

Citation : 2026 LiveLaw (SC) 905

Click here to download judgment

Appearance:

For Appellant(s) Mr. Shyam Divan, Sr. Adv. Mr. Saurabh Rajpal, AOR Mr. Vinay Kumar Singh, Adv. Mr. Siddhanth Singh, Adv. Mr. Rongon Chowdhary, Adv.

For Respondent(s) Mr. Pinaki Misra, Sr. Adv. Mr. Sumit Babar, Adv. Mr. Vikramaditya Singh, AOR Mr. Sajal Singhai, Adv. Mr. Hardeep, Adv. Ms. Yashika Gupta, Adv. Mr. Nitish Kant Sharma, Adv. Ms. Garima Prashad, Sr. A.A.G. Mr. Sudeep Kumar, AOR Ms. Rupali, Adv.

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