Vedanta could have another shot at the bauxite mining project in Orissa?s Niyamgiri if it promises to be within the confines of the legal framework, NC Saxena, member, National Advisory Council, who prepared the damning report on the project, told FE.
The Orissa government could appeal the matter in court, and if Vedanta restarted the process of taking permissions and stayed within the law, the project has a chance of revival, he said in an interview with FE.
According to sources, while the Orissa government is contemplating legal recourse after one of the biggest private investment proposals for the state was shown the red flag, it is not sure whether Vedanta has taken any legal advice.
Saxena also denied that he or anyone in the forest advisory committee of the environment ministry was inherently anti-industry or anti-development. ?India is not the only country which is industrialising or is grappling with issues of environmental degradation related to these processes,? he said. ?But the trend in Europe, US and other parts of the world has been to spend time and money on developing superior technology, which leads to less intrusive effects on the environment,? he added.
?Here, the effort is to subvert systems as it costs less than any genuine development of technology which would help you stay within the law and also lead to industrialisation without concomittant environmental degradation,? he said. The example he cited was of the reforestation plans that companies which would cut trees for projects would submit to the government. ?Most remain on paper, with no checks,? he said.
Saxena said that more than anything else, he fears that certain ambiguities in the Forest Rights Act, 2006 (FRA) would create some problems in land acquisition issues in the future. ?What FRA gives tribal and forest-dwelling communities is community rights but not ownership; so while their claims to use of forests is recognised, it is not the right to sell or own, or even devolve as inheritance. Their consent is required if forest land has to be acquired, but the government remains the owner of the land. This ambiguity will create problems in the future,? he said.
He added that the National Advisory Council of which he is a member will be looking into these aspects when assessing the implementation record of the Act.