In the past three years, the highest number of projects that were granted environmental clearance was in Gujarat, followed by Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra.

Of the total 2,040 projects cleared in the past three years, 273 are in Gujarat, 230 in Andhra Pradesh, 200 in Maharashtra and 156 in Orissa, according to the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF).

Interestingly, among the smaller States, the highest number of projects that received the green nod is in Chhattisgarh at 115 and Jharkhand at 112, both mineral-rich areas.

As on August 13, 2012, a total of 593 project proposals were awaiting environment and forest clearance, the Environment Minister, Jayanthi Natarjan, said in a written reply to Lok Sabha this week.

The Ministry has been under pressure to fast-track green clearances to send the right signals to attract investments. The Prime Minister’s Office had recently held a review meeting on coal projects being held up due to green clearances. After recent outages, the Ministry also came under fire for “stalling” of power projects, which it refuted as “factually incorrect’.

To fast-track clearances, the MoEF has now decentralised work, assigning some of the work to States and Union territories. Regular meetings of the expert appraisal panel, updating of project status on the Ministry’s Web site and uploading of sector-specific manuals are some of the other steps, the Minister said.

According to the Environment Impact Assessment Notification, 2006, there is a time of limit of 105 days from the date of receipt of complete information for grant of environmental clearance.

aditi.n@thehindu.co.in

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