Supreme Court upholds NGT’s cancellation of Bengaluru PRR clearance—fresh EIA mandatory under 2006 norms

Case Name: Bengaluru Development Authority v. Sudhakar Hegde & Ors.

Citation: 2020 INSC 303

Date of Order: 17 March 2020

Bench: Dr. Justice D.Y. Chandrachud and Justice Ajay Rastogi

Held: The Supreme Court held that the Peripheral Ring Road (PRR) project undertaken by the Bengaluru Development Authority required prior environmental clearance under the EIA Notification, 2006, as it qualified as an “expressway” within the meaning of Clause 7(f). The Court rejected the contention that the project commenced before the 2006 Notification came into force, observing that the final sanction under Section 19 of the BDA Act was issued only in June 2007. It was further held that the Environmental Impact Assessment relied on data collected in 2009–10 and was submitted in 2014, long after the expiry of the prescribed Terms of Reference, thereby violating the MoEF’s Office Memoranda. Consequently, the clearance granted by the SEIAA was invalid and could not be sustained in law.

Summary: The Bengaluru Development Authority conceived an eight-lane, 65-kilometre Peripheral Ring Road to decongest Bengaluru city and connect Tumkur Road to Hosur Road. Although preliminary notifications were issued in 2005, the final notification for acquisition and project sanction was issued only in 2007, well after the EIA Notification, 2006 had come into effect. The BDA applied for environmental clearance in 2009, and Terms of Reference were granted in November that year. However, the EIA report, based on primary data collected between December 2009 and February 2010, was submitted only in 2014. The National Green Tribunal quashed the clearance granted by the State Environment Impact Assessment Authority, holding that the assessment was prepared on the basis of outdated and invalid data, contrary to the mandatory timelines and procedural safeguards prescribed under the 2006 Notification.

Before the Supreme Court, the BDA argued that the PRR did not fall within the category of highways covered by Clause 7(f) of the Schedule to the Notification and that the project’s initiation in 2005 placed it outside the scope of the EIA framework. Rejecting these submissions, the Court held that the project, being an eight-lane, access-controlled, tolled road designed for high-speed vehicular movement, was an expressway within the meaning of the 2006 Notification. The Court also held that the 2009 amendment clarifying that “highways include expressways” was merely declaratory in nature and hence retrospective. Since the Terms of Reference had expired and the EIA relied on data more than four years old, the clearance was rendered legally unsustainable. The Supreme Court underscored that environmental safeguards are not procedural formalities but substantive obligations ensuring that developmental projects adhere to contemporary ecological assessments and transparency norms.

Decision: The appeal was dismissed, and the NGT’s direction for conducting a fresh rapid EIA was upheld. The Court reaffirmed that compliance with the EIA Notification, 2006 is mandatory for infrastructure projects and that environmental due diligence cannot be diluted under the guise of administrative expediency.