New Delhi: The Union environment ministry has given its final clearance to only 17% of the 48 proposals it received for providing forest land for defence projects across India, starting January 2014.

According to data from the environment ministry, the Centre received 48 proposals for defence projects from 1 January 2014 to 28 April 2016 from various states for forest clearance.

Of the 48 proposals, only eight (17%) got the final forest clearance, while 19 (around 40%) others received in-principle approval.

But as per the information provided by environment minister Prakash Javadekar, while replying to a query in Lok Sabha on Tuesday, nearly 40% (19) proposals for defence projects are either pending with the environment ministry or have been sent back to the state governments for want of better information.

Javadekar also revealed steps taken by the environment ministry to ease procedures for defence projects.

“The (environment) ministry has accorded general approval under Section 2 of the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980 for diversion of forest land for creation of critical public utilities by government departments in 117 Left-wing extremism (LWE)-affected districts, involving not more than 5 hectares of forest land in each case up to 31 December, 2018," Javadekar said.

He said the approval was given for strengthening infrastructure at India’s borders, “for construction and widening of two lane roads by BRO (Border Roads Organisation)/other agencies and widening of link roads, between border roads and national highways/state highways/other State roads in area falling within 100 km aerial distance from line of actual control irrespective of area of forest land involved (31st December, 2019)".

In the run-up to the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the environment ministry had come under severe criticism for holding up environment and forest clearances for several critical defence infrastructure projects.

Since coming to power, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government has stressed on easing rules and making green clearance procedures simpler for defence projects.

The government has even cleared projects involving diversion of forest areas inhabited by endangered wildlife. For instance in April 2016, the environment ministry gave a go-ahead to the diversion of over 150 hectares of forest in the Krishna wildlife sanctuary in Andhra Pradesh for setting up a missile testing facility, overriding concerns that it could threaten endangered Olive Ridley turtles and several bird species.

In September 2015, an expert panel of the environment ministry had approved the expansion of an air force base at Naliya in Kutch, Gujarat, one of the few places in the country where the Great Indian Bustard, which are less than 100 in number now, is found.

The Union environment ministry had also eased rules for forest land required for creation of border security-related infrastructure such as border roads, fencing, border outposts, flood lights, surveillance infrastructure and power infrastructure within a 5-km aerial distance from the international border, till 31 December 2019.

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