Noida: NGT’s order delay construction and possession of flats
National Green Tribunal (NGT) prohibits Noida Authority from possession of completed apartments for almost 20,000 home buyers. National Green Tribute has recently given a judgement which prohibits Noida Authority to do for all the projects located within 10km radius from Okhla bird Sanctuary. Many projects will not get approval due to this decision took by NGT. Other than completed apartments, there are another 30,000 apartments which are expected to be completed by next year. All the developments in this area are now going in a slow pace.
National Green Tribunal is a specialised organisation which deals with the cases of environmental protection, conservation of forests and other natural resources. The main function of NGT is to provide speedy environmental justice, reducing burden on the higher courts. The cases here are dealt within a maximum time period of six months. The NGT’s order of April this year shall not be cleared unless the National Board of Wildlife has given ‘No Objection’ Certificate.
Most of these projects are located in the sectors 74, 75, 76, 122 and 137. More than 40 developers who have projects in these areas had filed a petition in the SC claiming that the NGT had misinterpreted the SC’s decision in the Goa Foundation case in declaring 10-km radius of national parks and sanctuaries as the eco-sensitive area. Some of the developers who have projects along these areas include Jaypee, Logix, Gulshan Homz, Amrapali, Antriksh, Supertech, Paramount etc. All the projects have already received environmental clearance, but none of the builders were aware of such problem when they started the construction. Projects which are completed and are ready for possession should now be maintained by the developers without taking any charge from the buyers.
NGT has first given its order to stop all construction on October 28, 2013 along with a notification to the Central Government to fix the norms for the wildlife sanctuaries. The Centre has responded by asking the respective state governments to fix the issue. Both UP government and Delhi government has proposed to keep the non-development zone as 100m instead of 10km. After the proposal of UP government and Delhi government, CREDAI had requested NGT that the construction may be carried out for the projects which are beyond 100m subject to their getting environmental clearance on an undertaking that they are doing the construction at their own risk and money. But NGT has declined the request. Prohibiting construction upto 10km radius from the wildlife sanctuary is unrealistic and the government should not have given the environmental clearance for those projects in the first place, failing in which it is unfair for the government to prohibit the construction and delay in the projects.
