The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Withholding public hearing minutes strange: court

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jan 20, 2006

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Withholding public hearing minutes strange: court

Special Correspondent

Tuticorin Port Trust seeks direction to Pollution Control Board The Chief Justice says the Board will have to bear the cost escalation of the Rs. 680 crore project if it is held up

CHENNAI: The Tuticorin Port Trust has moved the Madras High Court for a direction to the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB) to forward the minutes of a public hearing held in connection with the port's inner harbour development project.

When the matter was taken up for hearing on Thursday, the First Bench, comprising Chief Justice A.P. Shah and Justice Prabha Sridevan, told Rita Chandrasekaran, counsel for the TNPCB, that the Board must be aware of its rights under the Central Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Notification and do its duty.

Stating that withholding of the minutes of the public hearing held on September 21, 2005 was "strange," the Chief Justice said the Board would have to bear the cost escalation of the Rs. 680 crore project if it was held up. He said the project was of national importance and the Board must not withhold the minutes when its duty under the Notification was to forward the minutes to the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests.

Appearing for the TPT, the Additional Solicitor-General, V.T. Gopalan, assisted by the Senior Central Government Standing Counsel, P. Wilson, submitted that the project was conceived after the port had surpassed its capacity of handling 15.8 million tonnes of cargo. The optimisation project would enable the port to handle cargo to the extent of 32.3 million tonnes, he said, adding that unless it was expanded immediately the international trade through the port would be affected.

In the petition, the TPT accused the Board, district administration and local elected representatives of resorting to delaying tactics and demanding certain details from the Centre though they were not authorised by the EIA Notification.

The Rs. 680-crore project, besides other works, envisages construction of two berths at a cost of Rs. 40 crore each, three shallow draught berths at an outlay of Rs. 30 crore and dredging the port's entrance channel and dock basin at a cost of Rs. 450 crore.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Tamil Nadu