S.N. Dubey & Ors. vs Raman Khandelwal & Ors.
Background
Local residents had approached the National Green Tribunal (NGT) seeking protection of an area called Bajrang Nagar Pahadi in Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, from development. The NGT appointed a Court Commissioner, who recommended declaring the area within one kilometre of the Gokulpur Talab (pond) a "no development zone" to protect its catchment area feeding the pond and the Narmada river. The NGT accepted this recommendation without modification. Three sets of appellants (the State of Madhya Pradesh, the Special Armed Forces (which owned much of the affected land), and private landowners) challenged this before the Supreme Court, arguing the NGT ignored the State's detailed objections based on its own development master plan survey.
Decision Breakdown
The Supreme Court found that the State had specifically placed on record a Master Plan survey distinguishing "direct" and "indirect" catchment areas and showing the disputed land was not a direct catchment area, but the NGT's order did not engage with this objection at all. It simply adopted the Court Commissioner's report wholesale. Citing its own recent ruling in a related matter (Benzo Chem Industrial Pvt. Ltd. v. Arvind Manohar Mahajan), the Court held that a tribunal must independently and carefully consider the material and arguments placed before it by both sides, and cannot discharge its adjudicatory function by merely rubber-stamping an outsourced expert report. On this ground alone, the NGT's orders were quashed and the appeals allowed, while clarifying that development permissions already granted through the proper environmental clearance process would continue to operate.
Lesson Learnt
A tribunal or regulatory body cannot decide a contested matter by simply adopting an external expert's or commissioner's report without engaging with the objections raised by the parties: genuinely independent consideration of both sides' evidence is a non-negotiable part of a fair adjudication.