National Green Tribunal on Thursday directed the state of Andhra Pradesh to post immediately the Environmental Clearance (EC) certificate which the state government claimed had been accorded to the Amaravati capital construction project. The Tribunal refused to give 10-day time to do this as requested by senior counsel of the state AK Ganguly, who said the EC had been obtained on October 9,2015 itself. Then the NGT asked what was the problem in posting it on the website immediately.

The NGT gave the government 24 hours time to upload on the CRDA website. A petition challenging taking up of construction of Capital Amaravati without getting environmental clearance is before the NGT.

“The NGT today took up the contempt petition or non-compliance petition filed by P Srimannarayana against the state government steps to clear the land in Amaravati to organize the foundation stone laying ceremony on October 22, 2015 violating the directions from NGT on October 10,” petitioner’s advocate K Sravan Kumar told ‘telugu360.com’ from New Delhi,According Sravan the petitioner’s counsel Sanjay Parikh did not agree with contention of state that the EC was granted on October 9 itself. If the contention was true, the respondent could have submitted the same to the NGT in the previous hearing held in October 10. ” What prevented the state from posting the certificate on the website,” Sanjay asked.

As the state had not made the EC public, Sanjay said, it should be construed that EC had not yet been granted. Today the state government also submitted maps and the information regarding the wet lands and flood prone areas in the Capital Development Region. The NGT issued notice to the state government to respond in a week to the contempt petition filed by the petitioner. The next hearing was posted on October 19, 2015, Sravan said.