The Palm Spring Plaza Condominium Association Versus Haryana State Pollution Control Board & Ors.

Coram:  Hon’ble Mr. Justice Adarsh Kumar Goel, Chairperson, Hon’ble Mr. Justice Sheo Kumar Singh, Judicial Member, Hon’ble Dr. Nagin Nanda, Expert Member
Keywords: Water pollution, polluter pays’ principle
Decision: Disposed
Date: 03.03.2021
The appeal was filed against order of the Haryana State PCB dated 16.12.2020. The facts of the appeal were that a commercial construction project has been developed by M/s Puri Constructions and M/s Emmar MGF Land Ltd. at Gurugram in Haryana. State PCB Found that it was violation of Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1974. Accordingly, show cause notice was issued to the Appellant, who had taken over the project from the original Project Proponent. The violations found were in violation of water quality thereby causing water pollution. It was submitted by Appellant that the service provider had taken over recently and it had no comments to make on the observations of the State PCB.
The State PCB vide order dated 02.09.2019 directed sealing of the project and disconnection of electricity. The State PCB passed closure order dated 18.09.2019. However, by later order dated 08.11.2019, the closure order dated 18.09.2019 was suspended. Main ground raised by the appellant is that it had been denied opportunity of being heard.
The Tribunal after considering the contentions of both the parties held that the appellant is liable to pay compensation on ‘polluter pays’ principle. The impugned order clearly mentions that the quantum of compensation is based on norms laid down by the CPCB which have been adopted by the Haryana Board on 29.04.2019. Violation of standards were found and at the earliest opportunity after show cause notice was given to the appellant, there was no denial thereof. At the time of inspection, the appellant was in possession of the premises where STP was installed, as is clear from the reply of the appellant dated 08.07.2019 itself. The appellant thus cannot deny its responsibility for the violation.
 Therefore, the Tribunal did not find any merit in the appeal and held that Natural justice have been followed. Show cause notice was duly given to the appellant and in the first reply by appellant there was no denial of the violations of norms as found. The appeal was therefore dismissed and the amount of compensation recovered was directed to be spent for restoration of the environment.