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30. Their Lordships of Hon'ble Supreme Court in AIR 2001 SC 184 in the case of Goa Foundation, Goa Vs. Diksha Holdings Pvt. Ltd. And others have held that no activities which would ultimately lead to unscientific and unsustainable development and ecological destruction should at all be allowed and the Courts must scrupulously try to protect the ecology and environment. Their Lordships have held as under :-

"6. Before we examine the materials on record to test the correctness of the rival submissions, we think it appropriate to notice one or two decisions, indicating the approach of a court in such matters concerning environment and development. The Calcutta High Court in the case of People United for Better Living in Calcutta-Public v. State of W.B.1 had the occasion to deal with a similar problem in relation to the wetland and the learned Single Judge (U.C. Banerjee, J., as he then was) came to the conclusion: (AIR Headnote) "There is no manner of doubt that the issue of environmental degradation cannot but be termed to be a social problem and considering the growing awareness and considering the impact of this problem on the society in regard thereto law courts should also rise up to the occasion to deal with the situation as it demands in the present day context: Law courts have a social duty since it is a part of the society and as such, must always function having due regard to the present day problems which the society faces. It is now a well-settled principle of law that socio-economic condition of the country cannot be ignored by a court of law. It is now a well- settled principle of law that while dealing with the matter, the social problems shall have to be dealt with in the way and in the manner it calls for, since benefit to the society ought to be the prime consideration of the law courts and ecological imbalance being a social problem   ought to be decided by a court of law so that the society may thrive and prosper without any affection."

"For so long as man continues to be the ruthless destroyer of lower living beings, he will never know health or peace. For so long as   men massacre animals, they will kill each other. Indeed, they who sow the seeds of murder and pain cannot reap joy and love."

19. Environmental law is an instrument to protect and improve the environment and to control or prevent any act or omission polluting or likely to pollute the environment. In view of the enormous challenges thrown by the industrial revolution, the legislatures throughout the world are busy in this exercise. Many have enacted laws long back and they are busy in remodelling the environmental law. The others have moved their law-making machineries in this direction except the underdeveloped States who have yet to come in this wavelength. India was one of those few countries which paid attention right from the ancient times down to the present age and till date, the tailoring of the existing law to suit the changing conditions is going on. The problem of law-making and amending is a difficult task in this area. There are a variety of colours of this problem. For example, the industrial revolution and the evolution of certain cultural and moral values of humanity and the rural and urban area developments in agricultural technology, waste, barren or industrial belts; developed, developing and underdeveloped parts of the lands; the rich and poor Indians; the population explosion and the industrial implosion; the people's increasing awareness and the decreasing State exchequer; the promises in the political manifestos and the State's development   action. In this whole gamut of problems the Tiwari Committee came out with the data that we have in India "nearly five hundred environmental laws" and the Committee pointed out that no systematic study had been undertaken to evaluate those legislative developments. Some legal controls and techniques have been adopted by the legislatures in the field of Indian environmental laws. Different legislative controls right from the ancient times, down to the modern period make interesting reading. Attention has to be paid to identify the areas of great concern to the legislature; the techniques adopted to solve those problems; the pollutants which require continuous exercises; the role of the legislature and people's participation outside. These are some of many areas which attract the attention in the study of history of the Indian environmental law.

i. Source Pollution problems are associated with all these types of transport as described above to some extent or other. Road transport method normally occasions the greatest number and range of environmental complaints. The principal areas of concern are public safety and inconvenience, noise and vibration, air pollution and visual intrusion. The main environmental disadvantages of rail transport are noise,   vibration and dust. The environmental problems connected with sea transport are at the loading and discharge points as similar to those of rail. Inland waterways transport also has the same type of environmental problems as described for sea transport. The pollution problems associated with the conveyors are dust and visual intrusion. In the same fashion for the aerial ropeways the problems are similar. Finally in the case of pipelines the only problem is the very slight possibilities of pollution from leaks.

c) In case of dust problems in the conveyors and aerial ropeways, this can be controlled by the use of water sprays, regular maintenance or by total enclosure. Visual intrusion problem connected with conveyors and aerial ropeways can be solved by careful selection of the route and minimising the height of structures.

9. ECOLOGICAL DISTURBANCE In the overwhelming majority of cases, the reclamation for whatever purpose of abandoned mineral workings require the establishment and maintenance of vegetation on the disturbed land. No other medium can achieve rapid visual reintegration, surface stabilisation or reductions in air and water pollution nor offer a wide variety of land use possibilities which can be achieved at acceptable cost. The design of the mining programme materially causes revegetation problems. In natural circumstances, plants exist in a soil, formed by weathering and biological processes from a parent rock which may or may not underlie it. The precise type of soil, which forms, depends upon the complex interactions between the parent rock, the climate, and the type of plants and animals which first colonise it.