In 5 yrs, 680 projects in protected areas given wildlife clearance

NEW DELHI: The National Board for Wildlife (NBWL) has never met during the past five years with all its 47 members in attendance. Only the standing committee of the NBWL, which the board constitutes and is authorised to exercise its powers, met 23 times between 2015-16 and 2019-20, a period during which 680 projects were granted wildlife clearance, the environment ministry informed the Rajya Sabha on September 14.

These projects are located in protected areas or wildlife-rich areas, and the fact that such a large number of projects were cleared without the full board meeting even once raised questions whether the NBWL was carrying out its mandate of promoting conservation of wildlife and development of forests,

“As per law it is the NBWL that constitutes the standing committee. If NBWL hasn’t even met in the past five years when and how did they constitute the standing committee?,”said environmental lawyer Ritwick Dutta.

“There is no power vested in the standing committee or even

NBWL to approve projects inside protected areas unless it is for the benefit of wildlife,” Dutta said.

The board is mandated to promote conservation of wildlife and development of forests, according to the Wildlife Protection Act. “We need to analyse data to see if there is an increase in wildlife clearances compared to previous years,” said a senior environment ministry (forest division) official on condition of anonymity.

An analysis of total wildlife clearances recommended or granted between 2010 and 2015 was not available, but according to a paper published on June 26, 2010, in the Economic and Political Weekly titled Diversion of Protected Areas: Role of the Wildlife Board, the standing committee of NBWL considered 244 projects for diversion of forests in wildlife areas between 1998 and 2008.

Out of the 244 cases considered between 1998 and 2008, 25 cases were approved, 17 rejected and 202 cases were kept pending. These proposals were for the non-forest use of 2,75,875 hectares within protected areas.