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The Supreme Court on March 21 constituted a seven-member committee to find a balance between conservation measures for the Great Indian Bustard (GIB) and efforts to generate renewable energy in the same regions.
The development came during the hearing of the case, M.K. Ranjitsinh v. Union of India, which goes back to 2019. Although the top court had given a judgment in the case in 2021, it continued to hear the case to ensure a smooth implementation of its ruling. The Supreme Court had ordered the installation of bird diverters where overhead power lines already exist, while leaving the door open for the conversion of overhead cables into underground power lines and the installation of underground power lines for future projects.
The GIB is an avian species, which was classified as ‘Critically Endangered’ by the International Union for Conservation of Nature in 2011 — there are currently less than 200 GIBs in India and they are mainly found in Rajasthan and Gujarat. The biggest threat to these birds is the overhead power lines as frequent collisions have resulted in the death of many GIBs.
Here is a look at the Supreme Court’s 2021 judgment and why it has now set up a new committee regarding the issue.
The 2021 judgment
In June 2019, former IAS officer M K Ranjitsinh filed the lead petition in the Supreme Court seeking protection for the GIB. The plea pointed out that the GIB’s habitat was confined to certain dry areas in the Kutch district and Thar desert in Gujarat and Rajasthan respectively. However, in recent decades, the two regions witnessed the creation of huge private and public renewable energy infrastructure, which resulted in the construction of overhead power lines. These power lines became the primary cause of the death of the GIB, according to the petition.
In its April 2021 decision, the court noted the Ministry of Power’s admission in an affidavit which said: “The Great Indian Bustard (“GIB”) lacks frontal vision. Due to this, they cannot detect power lines ahead of them, from far. As they are heavy birds, they are unable to manoeuvre across power lines within close distances. Thus, they are vulnerable to collision with power lines. In the case of low-voltage lines, electrocution is often the cause of death due to smaller phase to phase separation distance. High voltage lines do not cause death due to electrocution but cause death due to collision.”
For installing underground power lines in the future, the bench took note of two maps of the Thar and Kutch regions which demarcated ‘priority’ areas where the petitioners claimed “all power lines have to be undergrounded/disallowed”, and ‘potential’ areas where “power lines can be laid with proper mitigation measures (Bird diverters)”.
The court ordered the respondents — the Central government and the states of Rajasthan and Gujarat, among others — to install bird diverters in areas where overhead lines are already in place. Bird diverters are wheel shaped discs with panels, which reflect sunlight and moonlight, that are attached to power lines to alert birds from a distance to avoid collisions.
For undergrounding power lines, the court acknowledged that this would require “technical evaluation on case to case basis”. To conduct this analysis, the court constituted a three-member committee. It also held that any company seeking an exception from installing underground power lines in the Kutch and Thar regions will have to seek permission from the committee.
The 2024 order
On January 19, 2024, multiple solar and wind energy producing companies filed applications in the Supreme Court claiming that the April 2021 order was interfering with their ability to set up business in the Thar and Kutch regions. The Central government also appeared before the three-judge bench led by CJI D Y Chandrachud and highlighted the practical and financial difficulties involved in implementing the decision as over 80,688 square kilometres had been identified as ‘potential’ GIB habitat and 13,550 square kilometres as ‘priority’ GIB habitat and pushed for a balance between GIB conservation and renewable energy efforts.
The court asked Attorney General R Venkataramani to propose a way forward on the next date of hearing.
On March 19, the case was heard again and Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhatti recommended the creation of a technical committee constituted by the Ministry of Power to give recommendations on the undergrounding of power lines.
Senior Advocate Shyam Divan, appearing for the petitioners, cautioned the court against walking back its April 2021 decision, and stated that overhead power lines would pose an existential threat to the GIB. He also stated that if the GIB went extinct, it would be the first major avian species to go extinct since independence.
The bench appeared to be sympathetic towards the Centre’s stand that 80,688 sq km of land could not be earmarked for underground power lines, and suggested carving out a ‘critical’ area of roughly 6000 sq km where undergrounding could take place. The bench also directed both parties to come up with a list of names for a committee to tackle the GIB issue further.
On March 21, the parties returned with a list of names and the court acknowledged that its April 2021 order with “blanket” directions to underground power lines in the GIB potential area may need to be updated. It created a seven-member committee which has been tasked with suggesting conservation and protection measures for the GIB, identifying areas in the 13,000 sq km ‘priority’ area where power lines can be constructed as well as areas that are vital for the conservation of the GIB.
The committee has to submit a report by July 31 and the court has lifted the blanket restriction against constructing underground power lines.
