Notices issued to wildlife dept in Thar coal site reservoir case
By Our Staff Correspondent
2016-10-15
HYDERABAD: The Hyderabad circuit bench of the Sindh High Court on Thursday issued notice to the Sindh wildlife department (SWD) in a petition that challenged the construction of a reservoir in the TharCoalprojectarea.
A division bench of the court made part of record a statement submitted by the director general of the Sindh Environmental Protection Agency (Sepa), Naeem Mughal, who stated that Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) for the reservoir at Gorano village was approved onFeb 10 after completion of all legal formalities prescribed under law.
The reservoir named Effluent Disposal Scheme (saline water reservoir) would not cause any environmental destruction in the area and the petitioners had failed to raise objections (to the reservoir) at a public hearing held in this regard on April 17, 2015, he argued.
He said they filed the petition after an unexplained delay of over three months after issuance of no objection certificate (NoC) by Sepa. A number of alternate sites were considered but they either had environmental concerns or fell in the area covered under theRamsar Treaty, he said.
He maintained that some paragraphs were devoid of any merit in view of approval of EIA given to the reservoir being built under E ffluent Disposal Scheme pursuant to legal compliances. It was reservoir and no dam was being constructed (as claimed by the petitioners), he said.
He said that since the petitioners also failed to avail remedy provided under the Sindh Environmental Protection Act, 2014, the court should dismiss the petition at the outset.
The petitioners` counsel, Ayatullah Khowaja, contended that Section 14 of the Sindh WildlifeAct said that a permission was to be obtained for carrying out such an activity in the area but the respondents did not obtain that permission.
The petitioners, residents of Mithi, argued that it was a dam which was being built on their land near Gorano and other villages in Islamkot taluka. The covered area of the dam was 2,700 acres and it was supposed to store hazardous water to be extracted from coal mines.
The petitioners said the dam would destroy their own lands as well as those of other people living in 15 other villages which had a population of 15,000.
