Points of law : Given mandate of the NGT Act, exercise of discretion, as was done in this case, to reject appeal by dismissing application for condonation of delay, on ground that no sufficient cause was shown, was erroneous and based on a narrow reading of the law.

JUDGMENT

S. Ravindra Bhat, J. - The appellant is aggrieved by an order of the National Green Tribunal (hereafter referred to as "the NGT" [Dated 31.07.2020] ) and has, therefore, approached this Court under Section 22 of the NGT Act. The NGT rejected her appeal, preferred to it against the environmental clearance for construction of the Greenfield International Airport, Bhogapuram, Vishakapatnam, which had been sought for by the fifth respondent.

2. The facts are simple: the fifth respondent (hereafter called "the Project Applicant") proposed the construction of a new Greenfield international airport. As was required by law and extant statutory notifications, it applied to the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (hereinafter, the "MoEF") to seek environmental clearance. The MoEF, after following the prescribed procedure, which included ascertaining the views and objections of the concerned parties, the general public etc, indicated its approval by an order dated 14.08.2017. In terms of Section 19 of the NGT Act, the approval was posted on the website of the MoEF on 14.08.2017. Concededly, the Project Applicant published the approval in an English daily on 13.09.2017.

3. The appellant preferred her appeal to the NGT on 13.11.2017. Along with the appeal, she preferred an application for condonation of delay in approaching the NGT, given the stipulation of Section 19 that the appeal had to be preferred within 30 days from the date of communication of the order impugned. She explained that since the clearance and related documents were voluminous and the matter required some technical expertise, requiring the papers to be forwarded to experts and lawyers in Delhi, and the inter se communication delay, the NGT needed to condone the delay, in the interests of justice. After considering the submissions made by the appellant as well as the Project Applicant, which opposed the application for condonation of delay, the NGT, by its impugned order, rejected the appellant's application and consequently the appeal as well.

4. The appellant's arguments before this Court are mainly twofold: that the requirement of Section 16 is to "communicate the order to the concerned parties as well as the public and that a meaningful interpretation should be given to the provision". It was emphasised in this context that communication means not merely the publication on the Central Government's website, but also dissemination of the news or the decision to the affected parties. Learned senior counsel for the appellant -Ms. Anitha Shenoy, in this context, relied upon the terms contained in the environmental clearance/approval given by the MoEF, especially those which obliged the Project Applicant to intimate the decision in dailies having local circulation in the vernacular. She also relied upon the stipulations in the environmental clearance ("EC") which prescribed that the successful project applicant had to, in continuation to so publishing the decision or intimation in local newspapers, also ensure that the decision was forwarded to local communities through the Panchayats etc. for dissemination.

5. It was pointed out that the object of these conditions should be construed as part of a larger scheme of the Act to communicate every decision. The appellant argued that if a contrary interpretation were to be accepted, the appeal given by the statute would be meaningless as most often, large projects which involve either displacement of people or which affect habitats and have the tendency to damage or at least cause significant adverse impact upon the environment would not be considered on its merits by the NGT since people and neighbourhoods cannot be presumed to have knowledge of deliberations in New Delhi.

6. It was also argued on behalf of the appellant that in the circumstances of the present case, at least the appeal could not be said to be time barred. It was argued that the date for reckoning (limitation) is from 14.08.2017, when th