A Division Bench of the Kerala High Court on Wednesday asked the State Pollution Control Board (PCB) to state whether any study had been conducted by it on the proposed Aranmula airport project.
The Bench comprising Justice T.R. Ramachandran Nair and Justice B Kemal Pasha asked the counsel for the Board to get instruction and inform the court about the studies done by it, when a suo motu case initiated on the basis of a report of the Ombudsman for Travancore and Cochin Devaswom Boards came up for hearing.
Counsel for Aranmula Heritage Village Action Council submitted that it wanted to know whether the Pollution Control Board had done any studies on the proposed airport.
KGS Aranmula International Airport Ltd, promoter of the airport, on Wednesday produced the project report and site clearance certificate as directed by the court. The KGS group was earlier asked to submit all study reports submitted by them before various authorities for the implementation of the airport project as well as for obtaining various clearances.
Additional affidavit The Bench asked Advocate Commissioner S. Subash Chand to file an additional affidavit after going over the documents produced by the KGS group.
The Airport Authority of India and the State government also sought more time to get instructions from the officials concerned regarding the project.
The case was adjourned to February 3.
In his report submitted to the court, the Advocate Commissioner had pointed out that indiscriminate reclamation of paddy fields and blocking of Kozhithodu, a tributary of Pampa, for the establishment of the green field airport would be a perennial threat to Aranmula Sree Parthasarathi Temple.
Eco threat The Advocate Commissioner had further said that the indiscriminate reclamation of the paddy land and the blocking of the tributary of the Pampa would endanger valuable plant species, fishes and micro organism in the area.
