Courts now justify environment degradation: former Supreme Court judge

Former Supreme Court judge Justice Deepak Gupta on Wednesday said that courts now justify environmental degradation and attacked the judiciary over different decisions, ranging from a clean chit to Vantara to allowing the Great Nicobar project.

“The Supreme Court and the High Courts were very active. They took a pro-active role in protecting the environment. Unfortunately, that is not true anymore,” he said at the Anil Agarwal Dialogue 2026, organised by the Centre for Science and Environment, in Nimli of Rajasthan.

“Now, there are certain phrases which the court uses to justify environmental degradation. Procedure has become more important than the environment,” he said, adding that courts mostly check only if procedure is followed.

“I’m sorry, that is not where the court’s role finishes. The procedure may have been followed, but if the end result is an environmental disaster, the court is required to step in,” he added.

Two examples

“I want to give two (examples). The Nicobar case is one in which the NGT (said) procedure was followed. The procedure may be followed. I have read a court order that you cut trees in the Andamans, for palm oil plantations, which is the most damaging for the ecology. And the compensatory trees will be planted in Haryana and Rajasthan. What nonsense are we talking? Compensatory afforestation has become a joke,” the former Supreme Court judge said.

Justice Gupta said that the second example is the Vantara case. “I can’t understand how the Supreme Court went (about the case). To me, it seems like a stage-managed case. It seems that the Vantara people got the writ petition filed. The Supreme Court says that if a Chief Minister makes some remarks which are unpalatable, then go to the High Court. But in Vantara, the Supreme Court appointed a commission and the commission gave a report in one week and they said everything is hunky dory,” he said.

The former Supreme Court judge also said that the Central Empowered Committee (CEC), which was set up by the Supreme Court, earlier consisted of forest officials, bureaucrats, experts, and lawyers, among others, but now has only government officials.

“And reports (of the CEC) tend to now favour the government, as we saw in the Aravalli case,” he said, adding that there are other issues with the Aravallis, but he does not want to comment on them as the case is pending before the Supreme Court.

‘Judges depend on experts’

“Finally, we all blame the judges, but they depend on experts. And if the expert report is not proper, then what can they do? There are very few judges who will go beyond the expert report and analyse the expert report also,” he said.

Justice Gupta also said that there are many sensitive geographic areas where the court must step in. “But we (courts) also get tripped by the national security angle. [For] the Char Dham road, Justice Nariman passed an order saying the road width should be six metres or seven metres. Then a Lieutenant General files an affidavit saying that the Army required 20 metres or 30 metres. When the Army says, then you give it. As a judge, we cannot overrule everybody. But I know it from good sources; the gentleman was asked to give that affidavit, but it was never actually the requirement of the Army,” he said.

“It is because other things are at play, like the bigger the contract, you know there are other things that are big.So, the environment has taken a backseat,” he added.