The Head of a Government Department is deemed guilty for non-compliance with NGT orders unless proven otherwise, establishing accountability under the NGT Act.

ORDER :

Heard the learned counsel appearing for the appellants. None appears for the respondents.

2. An Original Application was filed by the appellants before the National Green Tribunal (for short, the "NGT"). The Original Application was decided by the NGT, Principal Bench, New Delhi by the order dated 23rd September, 2020. An application styled as an Execution Application was moved by the appellants before the NGT, Western Zone Bench, Pune basically invoking Sections 26 and 28 of the National Green Tribunal Act, 2010 (for short, the "NGT Act"). The allegation in the application is that 15 opponents named in the Execution Application are allegedly guilty of the failure to comply with the order dated 23rd September, 2020 passed by the NGT. By the impugned order, the NGT has come to the conclusion that Execution Application cannot proceed against respondent Nos. 1 to 15 who were not impleaded in their personal capacity in the Original Application. Therefore, a direction was issued to delete their names and implead the original respondents in the Original Application. This is the order impugned in the present appeal.

3. Sections 26 and 28 of the NGT Act read thus:

"26. Penalty for failure to comply with orders of Tribunal. -(1) Whoever, fails to comply with any order or award or decision of the Tribunal under this Act, he shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years, or with fine which may extend to ten crore rupees, or with both and in case the failure or contravention continues, with additional fine which may extend to twenty-five thousand rupees for every day during which such failure or contravention continues after conviction for the first such failure or contravention:

Provided that in case a company fails to comply with any order or award or a decision of the Tribunal under this Act, such company shall be punishable with fine which may extend to twenty- five crore rupees, and in case the failure or contravention continues, with additional fine which may extend to one lakh rupees for every day during which such failure or contravention continues after conviction for the first such failure or contravention.

(2) Notwithstanding anything contained in the code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (2 of 1974), every offence under this Act shall be deemed to be non-cognizable within the meaning of the said Code.

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28. Offences by Government Department. -(1) Where any Department of the Government fails to comply with any order or award or decision of the Tribunal under this Act, the Head of the Department shall be deemed to be guilty of such failure and shall be liable to be proceeded against for having committed an offence under this Act and punished accordingly:

Provided that nothing contained in this section shall render such Head of the Department liable to any punishment if he proves that the offence was committed without his knowledge or that he exercised all due diligence to prevent the commission of such offence.

(2) Notwithstanding anything contained in sub section (1), where an offence under this Act has been committed by a Department of the Government and it is proved that the offence has been committed with the consent or connivance of, or is attributable to any neglect on the part of any officer, other than the Head of the Department, such officer shall also be deemed to be guilty of that offence and shall be liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly." (underlines supplied)

4. Therefore, there is a provision to punish a person who fails to comply with any order of the NGT. If a Government Department fails to comply with the order of the NGT, by a legal fiction under sub-section (1) of Section 28, the Head of the Department shall be deemed to be guilty of such failure and shall be liable to be proceeded against. Relying upon these provisions, the officers of the State were impleaded as party respondents.

5. At the stage of issuing notice, the NGT could not have interfered. The reason