The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Rs. 30,000-crore petrochemical park proposal gets High Court nod

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Sunday, Mar 04, 2007
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Rs. 30,000-crore petrochemical park proposal gets High Court nod

Special Correspondent

Project within legislative competence of State Government, rules Division Bench

CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has dismissed all petitions challenging a proposal to set up a Rs. 30,000-crore petrochemical park near Chennai, on environmental grounds as well as violation of land acquisition norms.

Envisaged in 1997, the project was to come up on a 7,156-acre plot spread over Puzhudivakkam, Kattuppalli, Kalanji and Voyalur villages in Tiruvallur district. The public interest petitioners submitted that the park would affect the livelihood of small farmers and fishermen besides endangering environment.

Those aggrieved by the land acquisition said the Government ought not to have dispensed with the statutory hearing and entrusted TIDCO with the project after announcing that it would be implemented out by SIPCOT.

A Division Bench, comprising Justice P.D. Dinakaran and Justice P.P.S. Janarthana Raja, lamenting that a "magnificent" project "got marooned in legal cyclone and baffled the State economy extensively," said, "We are convinced that the objection to the proposed petrochemical park does not stand the test of logic, rational approach, eco-environmental realities, socio-economic development, well-settled legal principles and is opposed to the concept of sustainable development as well as the progress and prosperity of the nation."

The Bench concurred with Additional Advocate-General N. Kannadasan's submission that the project would provide direct employment to 10,000 engineers and technicians and indirect job opportunities to 25,000 others. Of the 7,156 acres, only 311 areas of land were wetland. Only 585 families needed to be rehabilitated.

Mr. Kannadasan said the project was within the legislative competence of the State Government and that no Coastal Regulatory Zone (CRZ) guidelines had been violated.

Mr. Justice Dinakaran, writing the judgment for the Bench, said the meat of the matter was a tussle between eco-environmental maintenance and vigorous industrialisation. "Sustainable development will put us on a path that ensures development while protecting the environment."

Maintaining that it would be unreasonable to postpone such major projects, he said there was a lot of scope for improving the quality of life of people in the region. He then ruled that the change of the requisitioning body from SIPCOT to TIDCO would not vitiate the process. A valid acquisition would not turn invalid by change of the user.

Mr. Justice Dinakaran said the Government had complied with all mandatory procedural requirements such as notifications in gazette and newspapers within 60 days. As for dispensing with the statutory hearing, he said the decision on urgency was an administrative one. It was a matter of subjective satisfaction of the Government.

"It is evident from the materials available on record that the Government, at the highest level, has applied its mind both for invoking the urgency clause and dispensing with the inquiry simultaneously."

On the contention that petroleum was a Central subject and the State lacked competence to acquire lands, the Judge said the power to acquire property could be exercised concurrently by the Union and the State. Holding there was no infirmity in the Government move, the Bench directed the Government to set up the park subject to environmental clearance by the Centre.

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