Additional Bench of the National Green Tribunal to be constituted in Chennai

In order to speed up the disposal of disputes pending before the southern Bench of National Green Tribunal (NGT), an additional bench is being set up in Chennai. Chennai already has a Bench for hearing cases from the southern states of Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh and the Union Territories of Puducherry and Lakshadweep, but the pendency before it has kept steadily increasing in recent times, necessitating the constitution of an additional Bench. At last count, the pendency of cases before the Southern Zone Bench of the NGT at Chennai is in excess of 1,500 cases.

National Green Tribunal, Southern Zone Bench at Chennai

One of the major reasons for the pendency in cases before the NGT Bench at Chennai is the lack of progress with respect to cases transferred from the High Courts in the four southern states, and especially from the High Court of Kerala. There are also frequent delays on the part of government departments concerned of other states and the Centre in filing their counter statement/replies. 

The NGT Bench at Chennai will be the first of the NGT Benches in the country to have an additional Bench. The NGT, which came into existence in 2010, has presently one bench each in New Delhi (principal bench), Bhopal (central zone), Pune (western zone), Kolkata (eastern zone) and Chennai (southern zone). 

The Tamil Nadu state Pollution Control Board vacated its office of the district environment engineer at Arumbakkam recently and civil work has begun to accommodate the additional Bench.

The existing Bench is headed by judicial member Justice M Chockalingam, and expert member R Nagendran.