In a move that will initiate prosecution of Lavasa Corporation, a Pune court ordered issue of process against nine directors and six officials of the Corporation on Thursday.
All the fifteen persons, including Chief Promoter Ajit Gulabchand have been asked to remain present in the court on January 30, according to the order issued by Chief Judicial Magistrate NT Ghadge. The order stated that summons to the effect will be issued by the court.
Present directors, including the non executive directors, will be summoned in the court. This includes Mr Gulabchand’s daughter Shalaka Gulabchand and several prominent businesspersons in the state: Venky’s co-owner Anuradha Desai, builder Anniruddha Deshpande, and Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar’s close aide and businessman Vitthal Maniar.
The Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB), by the directives of the Bombay High Court, had filed a criminal complaint under Sections 15 and 16 of the Environment Protection Act, 1986 with the court on November 4 against directors and officials of Lavasa Corporation for violating environmental laws. MPCB’s contention is that the Corporation failed to obtain the necessary clearances from the Centre according to the Environment Impact Assessment Notification,1994 as amended in 2004 and 2006.
Thursday’s court order was passed under Section 16 read with section 15, MPCB legal Officer D.T. Deole told The Hindu.
While Section 16 allows the prosecution of, “every person who, at the time the offence was committed, was directly in charge of, and was responsible to, the company for the conduct of the business of the company”, it is Section 15 that states that the accused can “face a penalty of Rs 1 lakh and imprisonment of up to five years or both.”
Directors K.G.Tendulkar, S.K.Khandelwal, S.K.Dharmadhikari, Sharad M. Kulkarni and Gautam Thapar were named by the MPCB. Lavasa officials include Chief Planning Officer S.P. Pendharkar, Chief Planner Ambuj Jain, Chief Operating Officer S Narayan and Associate Vice President Dnyanadeo Ghorpade.
Issuing summons now is only an eye wash and nothing positive will come out of it. The construction work is going on for several number of years now and entail huge investments. A cursory glance at the names behind the project including influential politicians is enough to show what direction the trail will take. Nevertheless, strong strictures need to be passed detailing the environmental protection guidelines to be followed by the developers so that pollution control measures are put in place and long term sustainability of environment need to be stressed. Milestone fine imposition norms are better thought of in advance when damage to and stress level of the environment is impacted. This should be a landmark judgement so that other developers does not flout the rules in future.
The Lavasa Drama is all set to be staged and what a farce it is likely to be.The best yet and no two opinions about it.The Court has, as usual issued a summons but this time to the promoter and Directors of the corporation.Although everyone expects it to be the best farce,the end is more likely to be a damp squib because the main Producer of the play is the State government ably assisted by the Ministry of Environment at the center.One can very easily predict the final result because of the type of Government the producer is.Yes,the producer is very well known as the REGULARIZATION RAJ which means its main function is to regularize every illegality committed by the wealthy.And so Lavasa will get away with a gentle tap (and not even a rap,mind you)on the knuckles and a token fine which will be peanuts for those bigwigs and everyone will be happy.After all this farce,one wonders why whether at all we need a Ministry of Environment whose function is only to regularize.
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