All necessary steps taken before giving nod to power project: MoEF

NEW DELHI: The Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF) has claimed before the National Green Tribunal (NGT) that it had taken "all necessary steps" before granting environmental clearance to a mega hydro-power project in Arunachal Pradesh on Lohit river, which originates in China.

The MoEF counsel made the submission to the Tribunal in response to a petition by an challenging the environmental clearance granted to the 1,750 MW Demwe Lower Hydro Electric project on February 15 by by the ministry despite majority of wildlife experts on the ministerial committee opposing it.

"MoEF and the state government (of Arunachal Pradesh) have taken all necessary steps in this regards," senior advocate A D N Rao, appearing for the Ministry, told an NGT bench of its Acting Chairperson Justice A Suryanarayan Naidu and Gopal Krishna Pandey.

"Each and every thing that could have been considered has been considered before granting clearance. All the objections raised (by the petitioner) were considered," Rao added.

The statement was, however, opposed by advocate Ritwick Dutta, who, appearing for NGO North East Affected Area Development Society, contended that environmental clearance was granted to the project even before the requisite studies under the Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) Notification of 2006 were completed.

"The Environment Appraisal Committee and the Forest Appraisal Committee say comprehensive study has to be now done. So those studies were not complete and some of them are still pending while the environment clearance has been granted," Dutta said.