The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has asked the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) to review the environmental clearance granted for the expansion of a group housing project in Gurugram’s Sukhrali village.
The direction came while the tribunal was hearing a plea filed by the resident welfare association (RWA) of the housing project, challenging the environmental clearance (EC) granted by the Haryana State Environment Impact Assessment Authority (SEIAA) for the project’s expansion.
The RWA alleged that the clearance was granted without a proper assessment of the project’s potential environmental impact, particularly concerning groundwater extraction, waste management, and air quality.
A bench led by NGT Chairperson Justice Prakash Shrivastava, along with expert member A. Senthil Vel, noted that a three-member expert committee had been constituted in 2021 to re-examine the environmental impact of the project and submit its findings to the SEIAA for reconsideration.
However, the bench observed that the term of the SEIAA had since expired and a new authority had not yet been constituted by the state government. “If the SEIAA is not constituted in the state, such an exercise is to be done by the MoEFCC in terms of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Notification,” the tribunal clarified.
The bench directed the Union Environment Ministry to act in compliance with the tribunal’s earlier order dated May 31, 2021, and revisit the environmental clearance. It further instructed the ministry to decide whether the EC should be affirmed, revoked, or modified with additional safeguards.
“We require the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change to do the needful in compliance with the order of the tribunal dated May 31, 2021, and revisit the environmental clearance and pass further appropriate order granting or not granting environmental clearance or imposing additional conditions,” the order stated.
The green tribunal granted eight weeks to the MoEFCC to complete the exercise and listed the matter for further proceedings on January 30, 2026.
