IAS/UPSC Coaching Institute  

09 Jan 2026 : Top court’s green governance, cause for uncertainty

 Editorial 2: ​​Top court’s green governance, cause for uncertainty

Context

The Supreme Court should safeguard the environment by holding the State accountable and bringing it back within the framework of effective regulation.

 

Introduction

Over the last decade, the Supreme Court of India has gradually shifted from its traditional role of reviewing the legality of administrative action to issuing prospective, quasi-regulatory directions in significant environmental cases. This transformation has largely arisen in situations where statutory regulators have failed to discharge their duties, thereby drawing the Court into a managerial and supervisory role.

  • However, instead of correcting regulatory failures and restoring institutional responsibility, the Court has often continued to function as a substitute regulator, inadvertently deepening the problem.
  • This sustained judicial involvement—particularly through continuing mandamus that extends across multiple domains has wide-ranging implications for regulated entities, the State, and the public, and therefore calls for greater restraint and recalibration.

 

Rulings

  • In June 2022, the Supreme Court of India directed that all protected areas must have an eco-sensitive zone (ESZ) of at least one kilometre, aiming for uniform environmental protection.
  • By April 2023, this direction was diluted, exempting areas where the Environment Ministry had already notified ESZs, after States highlighted implementation difficulties.
  • In December 2015, the Court imposed a ban on registration of diesel cars and SUVs above 2,000 cc in the Delhi-NCR to address air pollution.
  • In August 2016, the ban was lifted and replaced with a compensatory charge, widely reported as 1%–2% of the ex-showroom price, signalling a shift from prohibition to mitigation.
  • In 2025, the Court initially ordered no coercive action against 10- and 15-year-old diesel and petrol vehicles, respectively, but later narrowed the protection to vehicles below Bharat Stage-IV standards.
  • In the firecracker cases, the Court alternated between near-total bans in the NCR due to pollution concerns and partial relaxations during festivals, permitting limited categories like “green crackers”, citing enforcement and public order constraints.

 

Shifts

  • Regulatory gaps—such as fragmented enforcement, delayed notifications, weak monitoring, and ad hoc exemptions—frequently prompted judicial intervention.
  • Instead of compelling regulators to fulfil their statutory duties, the Court often assumed a quasi-regulatory role, effectively substituting itself for executive authorities.
  • The Court’s reasoning has increasingly moved from legality to consequences, weighing practical and economic fallout alongside environmental principles.
  • In May 2025 (Vanashakti vs Union of India), the Court held that ex post facto environmental clearances violate core environmental norms, but in a November review, it reconsidered this position, citing concerns over disrupting ongoing commercial activity.
  • Across these cases, the Court has tended to announce broad, principled rules first and then manage their consequences later, reflecting an impulse to govern rather than to strictly adjudicate.

 

The Issue of Expertise

  • Expertise has functioned both as support and as a point of contestation once the Supreme Court of India began issuing forward-looking directives.
  • In the Aravalli matter, the Court’s November 20 order adopted a uniform definition of the “Aravalli hills and ranges” to regulate mining, relying on a committee’s findings.
  • Within weeks, the Court kept the order in abeyance and decided to constitute a fresh committee after concerns arose that the definition could have unintended legal and regulatory consequences.
  • A similar pattern emerged in the ESZ issue, where a uniform buffer zone initially appeared decisive but later faced resistance from States and stakeholders once it became clear that ecological conditions and feasibility differ widely across regions.
  • While the Court has relied on expert inputs to offset its institutional limits, it has also questioned or revisited expert conclusions, creating a push–pull dynamic that has often resulted in policy reversals or U-turns.

 

Consequences for Public Challenge

  • The Court’s role as a de facto approving authority has had significant implications for public participation and challenge.
  • Project proponents and governments increasingly approach the Court for permissions even before statutory authorities complete their scrutiny.
  • This practice confers an early sense of finality, which can discourage later objections and contestation before regulatory bodies or other courts.
  • The deeper concern is not merely the risk of technical error, but that the Court’s premature entry into the approval process can stifle meaningful judicial review in other fora.
  • Consequently, when the Court modifies or reverses earlier rules, it also reshapes who gets heard and what evidence is considered, thereby altering the terrain of environmental adjudication itself.

 

Need for Stability

  • Many of these environmental disputes unfold within continuing mandamus frameworks, marked by serial interim orders, committee reports, affidavits, and repeated modifications, which make course correction easy but often undermine regulatory stability.
  • Rather than frequent recalibration, the Supreme Court of India could adopt a steadier and more restrained approach, focusing on protecting the environment by compelling the State to return to effective regulation.
  • This can be achieved by clearly defining thresholds for when the Court will issue managerial or supervisory directions, and by requiring time-bound regulatory action supported by reasons and publicly available data.
  • At the same time, the Court can preserve its core judicial role by limiting itself to reviewing legality and procedural compliance, rather than ongoing administration.
  • Uncertainty can be reduced by avoiding broad, sweeping rules that immediately necessitate exceptions, and by clarifying in advance the types of evidence or implementation constraints that would justify future modification of its directions.

 

Conclusion

In this approach, regulated actors would be governed by clear and enforceable rules rather than flexible or negotiable directives, while governments would be spared the uncertainty of parallel decision-making structures. At the same time, the public would gain clarity on where responsibility lies and the appropriate forums and processes through which environmentally harmful activities can be challenged, strengthening both accountability and environmental protection.