Tata Housing Development Auth. v. Aalok Jagga, Civ. App. Nos. 8398-8399 of 2019 (5 November 2019)

In Tata Housing Development Auth. v. Aalok Jagga, the Supreme Court of India halted a large-scale residential housing development proposed within a buffer zone of a wildlife sanctuary in the state of Punjab.

In reaching its decision, the Supreme Court spoke about the impacts of human development on the environment, emphasizing the need to protect biodiversity:

The most potent threat faced by the earth and human civilization as a whole which is confronted with, today, is environmental degradation and wildlife degeneration. The need to protect flora and fauna which constitutes a major portion of our ecosystem is immediate. Development and urbanization coming at the cost of adversely affecting our natural surroundings will in turn impact and be the cause of human devastation[.]

Id. at para. 25. The Court faulted state officials for failing to safeguard wildlife habitat, as required by India’s constitution and environmental protection laws (“The State shall endeavour to protect and improve the environment and to safeguard the forests and wild life of the country” and “It shall be the duty of every citizen of India­ (g) to protect and improve the natural environment including forests, lakes, rivers and wild life, and to have compassion for living creatures.” Constitution of India, Articles 48(A) and 51(A)(g) (per Tata Housing Development Auth. v. Aalok Jagga at para. 28)). The Court also discussed issues of sustainable development. Id. at paras. 31 et seq.

Finally, the Court described and applied the Public Trust Doctrine:

The ancient Roman Empire developed a legal theory known as the “Doctrine of the Public Trust.” It was founded on the ideas that certain common properties such as rivers, seashore, forests and the air were held by Government in trusteeship for the free and unimpeded use of the general public. Our contemporary concern about “the environment” bear a very close conceptual relationship to this legal doctrine. . . . 

The Public Trust Doctrine primarily rests on the principle that certain resources like air, sea, waters, and the forests have such a great importance to the people as a whole that it would be wholly unjustified to make them a subject of private ownership. The said resources being a gift of nature, they should be made freely available to everyone irrespective of the status in life. The doctrine enjoins upon the Government to protect the resources for the enjoyment of the general public rather than to permit their use for private ownership or commercial purposes.

It is no doubt correct that the public trust doctrine under the English common law extended only to certain traditional uses such as navigation, commerce, and fishing. But the American Courts in recent cases have expanded the concept of the public trust doctrine. . . . The observations of the Court in Mono Lake case to the effect that the protection of ecological values is among the purposes of public trust may give rise to an argument that the ecology and the environment protection is a relevant factor to determine which lands, waters or airs are protected by the public trust doctrine. . . . We see no reason why the public trust doctrine should not be expanded to include all ecosystems operating in our natural resources.

Tata Housing Development Auth. v. Aalok Jagga at para. 30 (citing M.C. Mehta vs. Kamal Nath and others, (1997) 1 SCC 388, paras. 24 et seq). Given the project’s close proximity to the wildlife sanctuary (within 200 meters), the Court declared, “in our opinion, no such project can be allowed to come up in the area in question. The State of Punjab was required to act on the basis of Doctrine of Public Trust. It has failed to do so.” Id. at para. 36.