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REPORTABLE

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA

CIVIL ORIGINAL JURISDICTION

IA NO.36 AND IA NO.44

IN

WRIT PETITION (C) No.967 OF 1989

Indian Council for Enviro-Legal Action

… Petitioners

Versus

Union of India & Others

… Respondents

JUDGMENT

Dalveer Bhandari, J.

1.

This is a very unusual and extraordinary litigation where

even after fifteen years of the final judgment of this court (date

of judgment 13^th February, 1996) the litigation has been

deliberately kept alive by filing one interlocutory application or

the other in order to avoid compliance of the judgment. The

said judgment of this Court has not been permitted to acquire

finality till date. This is a classic example how by abuse of the

process of law even the final judgment of the apex court can

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be circumvented for more than a decade and a half. This is

indeed a very serious matter concerning the sanctity and

credibility of the judicial system in general and of the apex

court in particular.

2.

An environmentalist organisation brought to light the

sufferings and woes of people living in the vicinity of chemical

industrial plants in India. This petition relates to t