National Green Tribunal
Swapnesh Sherlekar vs State Of Goa on 27 February, 2024
Item No.5 (Pune Bench)
BEFORE THE NATIONAL GREEN TRIBUNAL
WESTERN ZONE BENCH, PUNE
THROUGH PHYSICAL HEARING (WITH HYBRID OPTION)
Original Application No.72/2023(WZ)
I.A. No.45/2024(WZ) & I.A. No.46/2024(WZ)
Mr. Swapnesh Sherlekar & Anr.
.....Applicant(s)
Versus
The State of Goa and Ors.
....Respondent(s)
Date of hearing: 27.02.2024
CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE DINESH KUMAR SINGH, JUDICIAL MEMBER
HON'BLE DR. VIJAY KULKARNI, EXPERT MEMBER
Applicant : Mr. Vishal Sawant, Advocate
Respondent(s) : Ms. Supriya Dangare, Advocate for R-1/State of Goa &
R-3/DCF
Mr. Zeller C. De Souza, Advocate for R-5/Village Panchayat,
Mormugao
Mr. Shivan Desai, Advocate along-with
Mr. Shivshankar Swaminathan, Advocate for R-8/PP
ORDER
1. From the side of applicants, learned counsel Mr. Vishal Sawant has appeared, who has filed I.A. No.46/2024(WZ) praying therein for impleadment of the Review Committee on Private Forests through its Chairman as respondent No.9 in the present application, alleging therein that this Review Committee was constituted by the respondent No.1- The State of Goa through its Chief Secretary to review the provisionally identified private forest areas by the South Goa Forest Division Committee (also known as Thomas and Araujo Committee), which has declared in its interim reports that the property bearing Survey No.194/1 of Village Sancoale does not qualify to be a private forest, which is completely arbitrary, as the said property was finally identified as private forest by the South Goa Forest Division Committee and as per the Notification dated 20.01.2020 (the learned counsel for applicants submits Page 1 of 4 that this date i.e. 20.01.2020 is mentioned wrongly due to typographical error, as the same should be 21.01.2020 and Notification related to that is annexed at page no.144 of the paper book of the present Original Application), issued by the State of Gao constituting the Review Committee.
2. By the same application, the deletion of respondent No.6- a Partnership Firm- Good Earth Developers has been prayed because notice issued to the said respondent returned unserved, as the door was found locked and upon inquiry being made in this regard, it transpired that the said firm was not in existence.
3. From the side of respondent No.8- Mr. Avez Azim Shaikh, learned counsel Mr. Shivan Desai has appeared before us, who submits that he has no objection to this I.A. No.46/2024(WZ) being allowed. But in respect of deletion of the respondent No.6, the same may be permitted at the applicants' own risk.
4. From the side of respondent No.1- The State of Goa through its Chief Secretary and for respondent No.3- Dy. Conservator of Forest, South Goa Division, learned counsel Ms. Supriya Dangare has appeared, who submits that she has no objection to this I.A. being allowed.
5. From the side of respondent No.5- The Village Panchayat of Sancoale, learned counsel Mr. Zeller C. De Souza has appeared, who submits that he has also no objection to this I.A. being allowed.
6. In view of above, we allow this application partly, as we direct the applicants to implead the Review Committee on Private Forests through its Chairman as respondent No.9 in the present Original Application today itself and with respect to deletion of the name of respondent No.6, since we are of the view that simply because effecting service, on the respondent No.6 is not being possible for the applicants, is not a proper Page 2 of 4 ground to delete the said respondent from the array of the parties, we direct the applicants to effect the service of notice upon the said respondent through a publication in the local newspaper, where the said partnership firm had last worked.
7. In this regard, we direct the Registry to issue notice to the respondent No.6, returnable within four weeks. Steps shall be taken by the applicants within that period.
I.A. No.46/2024(WZ) stands disposed of accordingly. I.A. No.45/2024(WZ)
8. This application has been filed by the applicants with the prayers that after para no.26, new para no.26a, 26b, 26c and 26d be added; in the Ground L, new Ground L be added; in the prayer clause (b), new prayer clause (b) be substituted; and in the prayer clauses, new prayer clause (i) be added.
9. It is mentioned by the learned counsel for applicants that these amendments are necessary for effectively adjudicating the issues involved in the present application and hence the same may be allowed to be incorporated in the present Original Application.
10. The learned counsel for applicants has urged that the Survey No.194/1 of Village- Sancoale was identified by the Thomas and Araujo Committee as finally identified Private Forest and therefore, if the same was required to be excluded from the final list of the Private Forest by the Review Committee, as per the Judgment of this Tribunal in Original Application No.478/2018 read-with M.A. No.03/2023, the physical verification/ground truthing was required to be done. But even without that, the said Survey Number has been excluded from the final list of identified Private Forests.
Page 3 of 4
11. When we enquired from the learned counsel for applicants as to why in Annexure A-1, which is annexed with the said application from page nos.850 to 864 of the paper book, which contains Survey Numbers identified and finalized by Thomas and Araujo Committee for an area of 8.64 sq. km. in the State of Goa, the Survey No.194/1 is not found mentioned because it was only then that the said Survey Number could have been considered to have been finally identified by the said Committee as finally identified Private Forest and would have qualified to be excluded by the Review Committee after visiting the site to ascertain the same was a Private Forest or not, he could not respondent to the same, rather he tried to refer to some other report. It appears that there was some miscommunication because the reference of a report, which is being made by the learned counsel for applicant, is a different one than the report, we had referred to him as Annexure- A-1, annexed with the said application. Therefore, we direct the learned counsel for applicants to appear before us physically on the next date and explain as to how the Survey No.194/1 is not found mentioned in the said list.
12. A copy of I.A. No.45/2024(WZ) has already been served upon all other parties. Therefore, we direct that if any objection against the said I.A. is required to be filed, the same may be filed within two weeks.
13. Registry is directed to list I.A. No.45/2024(WZ) for disposal on 08.05.2024.
Dinesh Kumar Singh, JM Dr. Vijay Kulkarni, EM February 27, 2024 Original Application No.72/2023(WZ) I.A. No.45/2024(WZ) & I.A. No.46/2024(WZ) P.Kr Page 4 of 4