India: Centre Agrees to Translate EIA Draft In 22 Vernaculars

The Delhi High Court has informed that the Central Govt. is ready to translate Environment Impact Assessment Policy, 2020 into 22 Vernacular Languages. The petitioner found from an RTI reply that currently it was only translated to 3 languages as on 30^th July 2020. The court had passed a order on 30^th June 2020, where the Ministry of Environment Forest and Climate Change was asked by the court to extend the deadline for public comments on the above mentioned policy which turned out to be pretty controversial thanks to how easily ‘developmental projects’ could get approvals, for deviating from the polluter-pays principle and for allegedly diluting the impact assessment process to condone projects which might not be sustainable. The court had also directed the ministry to translate the draft in at least the languages under VII Schedule of the Constitution and make the same available on the ministry website as well as at the respective Environment Ministries and Pollution Control Boards. However, the same was apparently not adhered to.