Time for India and Sri Lanka to champion regional environmental constitutionalism, says SC judge

Speaking at the Faculty of Law, Colombo, at the ‘Indo-Sri Lanka Policy Dialogue’ on ‘Advancing Environmental Sustainability and Regional Cooperation’, Justice Kant said the region between the two countries has, in recent times, re-emerged as “a strategic corridor, rich in marine resources but ecologically stressed”.

He lauded initiatives such as BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation) and the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA), saying they reflect this “burgeoning recognition that environmental security is integral to regional stability”.

Justice Kant said despite measures such as the reactivation of the Joint Working Group on Fisheries in 2016, the India-Sri Lanka Maritime Boundary Agreements and the 2022 MoU on Renewable Energy Cooperation, “there is a lack of an integrated transboundary environmental governance mechanism, which may be a result of multiple factors, including inconsistent data collection, considering that environmental impact assessments rarely take cross-border effects into account.”

He flagged that “perhaps the solution to filling these gaps lies in judicial and civil-society oversight.”

Highlighting the role played by the Supreme Courts of India and Sri Lanka in developing environmental rights, he said “both courts have… increasingly drawn on international environmental norms, illustrating a nascent regional environmental constitutionalism.”

According to Kant, there has been no regular formal dialogue between Indian and Sri Lankan judiciaries in the past, but “their jurisprudence reflects a converging moral imagination about environmental stewardship.”

“In the absence of robust regional institutions, courts become de facto arenas for transnational accountability. Judicial pronouncements influence executive behaviour,

compel environmental reporting, and often drive policy reform. The potential for structured judicial dialogue could formalise this exchange and strengthen the normative coherence of environmental law between the two jurisdictions,” Justice Kant added.

These are the steps he had suggested in this regard: “(i) Establishing a Joint Commission on Marine Ecology, empowered to issue ecological advisories; (ii) Creating data-sharing protocols for pollution and fisheries management; (iii) Encouraging judicial workshops under BIMSTEC to develop common interpretive standards for environmental rights.”

Pointing out that “the Bay of Bengal does not divide us; it binds us through a shared ecological fate”, Justice Kant said “sustained environmental cooperation also depends on informed citizen engagement. Universities, legal institutes and non-governmental organizations can function as transnational epistemic communities — generating data, influencing litigation and cultivating ecological consciousness.”

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