NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court has rebuked the Meghalaya government for not sending its chief secretary for the hearing on non-utilisation of environment funds.
On Wednesday, the Apex Court noted that states, including Meghalaya, were “diverting” huge amount of funds, meant for protection of environment and benefit of people, to other purposes like municipal works.
A bench of justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta said that around Rs 75,000 crore, including Rs 50,000 crore of the Compensatory Afforestation Funds Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA), was lying with governments and asked whether there was any plan to utilise the money.
The Supreme Court directed the Meghalaya chief secretary to appear before the apex court on Monday without fail for another round of hearing.
The counsel representing Meghalaya said the chief secretary could not appear before the court because there was “some confusion about the date of hearing owing to typographical error” prompting laughter inside the court. The chief secretary had already fixed other appointments on Wednesday, he added.
The state counsel wanted another date to which the bench refused to accede and the chief secretary was directed to appear on Monday.
It had earlier directed the chief secretary to appear before it after perusing the affidavit filed by Meghalaya in which it was said that funds meant for welfare of people were kept in bank. The top court had earlier said there were around 10 to 12 funds which have been created after the top court orders on environmental and as per information placed before it, the amount lying idle was in the range of Rs 75,000 crore.
“What are the obligations of a state? It (these funds) is not for opening schools. It is meant for environment, rights of tribals in the villages. What is happening is that the states are diverting these funds to do municipal works and their other obligations,” the bench observed.
The bench had earlier asked the Centre as to how the huge amount was being utilised.
Earlier, the Supreme Court had pulled up Meghalaya for not utilising the funds. The same bench had said the affidavit filed by the state did not even mention clearly the amount under CAMPA lying in the banks.
“It is too much… This is turning out to be a joke,” the bench had said and termed it a “very badly drafted” affidavit. It granted four weeks to Meghalaya to file a better affidavit and had asked the chief secretary to be present on Wednesday.
During the hearing, Additional Solicitor General ANS Nadkarni, appearing for the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, told the bench that the funds were lying “safely” and the question was how to utilise it. To this, the bench asked, “Will it be utilised in buying cars, laptops and washing machines?”
“No,” Nadkarni responded and added that rules were being framed for utilisation of the money. The rules were finalised at the level of the ministry and now the approval of the Ministry of Law and Justice is awaited, Nadkarni informed.
The court was hearing a PIL filed in 1985 by environmentalist M C Mehta who had raised the issue of air pollution in the Delhi-National Capital Region. A “frustrated” Apex Court had rued that around Rs 1 lakh crore worth of funds meant to protect the environment and benefit people was diverted for other purposes.
