The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has come down heavily onto the state’s coastal body – Goa Coastal Zone Management Authority (GCZMA) – for severe illegalities and delays on the path of the body to file its replies in cases pending for over two years.
Earlier this week, the NGT had said that the GCZMA, through its negligent attitude was indirectly helping illegalities to occur. Yesterday again, the NGT, New Delhi, issued another stringent order against the body’s negligence in filing replies pertaining to illegal structures within the coastal regulation zones (CRZ). The NGT pointed out that the replies were pending in cases from 2018 and have still not been filed.
The NGT Principal Bench in New Delhi has directed the GCZM Member Secretary to submit a list of all the pending cases against the authority with regards to CRZ violations in which it has submitted and not submitted the reply. It has also asked the Member Secretary to be present in person and narrate the reason in those cases where the replies have not been filed.
The green watchdog also stated that this is a very sorry state of affairs from the path of the coastal body. “It is a very sorry state of affairs that in the case pending from 2018 reply has not been filed to date,” the order stated. This comes as a major embarrassment for the state body as, despite two years’ time, many replies are still pending from the body.
On Tuesday this week, the west zone branch of the NGT had also expressed its anger over the coastal body’s attitude in initiating action against illegal structures in CRZ areas. It had questioned the body saying, “when the law protector becomes the law violator, how will the law be protected?”
Through this, the body is helping illegalities to occur, and once citizens start feeling helpless, it will damage democracy, the NGT had observed.
Meanwhile, the NGT’s Principal bench has set a fresh deadline of December 31, 2020, for the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) to finalize the Eco-Sensitive Zones (ESZ) of the Western Ghats.
