Srinagar, Aug18: The Environmental Policy Group (EPG) has called for immediate judicial and statutory scrutiny of the proposed Rs 104.02-crore Plug-and-Play Industrial Park at Nowgam, stating that the project raises a fundamental question of conformity with the approved Srinagar Master Plan–2035 and a specific restriction imposed by the State Administrative Council (SAC) to protect a flood-absorption basin.
The proposed industrial park, spread over approximately 50 acres, envisages industrial plots, roads, utilities, warehouses, factory sheds, worker facilities and associated infrastructure. EPG said such intensive development could potentially convert permeable and low-lying land into a built-up environment and alter the flood-storage, flood-conveyance and drainage functions of the wider Pantha Chowk–Nowgam landscape.
“Flood basins are not vacant land. They are natural public infrastructure, and their storage capacity cannot be treated as surplus land available for urbanisation,” the group said.
EPG said the issue assumes particular significance because the restriction on development along the Pantha Chowk–Nowgam NH Bypass corridor is not a new environmental objection but forms part of the approved statutory planning framework.
The Draft Master Plan Srinagar, along with the recommendations of the committee constituted for its examination, was placed before the SAC for approval under Section 9 of the J&K Development Act, 1970. The Master Plan–2035 was approved by the SAC along with the committee’s recommendations vide Decision No. 40/5/2019 at its meeting held on February 13, 2019, at Raj Bhavan, Jammu, except for the committee’s recommendation concerning development along the NH Bypass from Pantha Chowk to Nowgam.
EPG said the SAC approved the departmental proposal with a specific modification that: “NO DEVELOPMENT/CONSTRUCTION ACTIVITY BE PERMITTED ALONG THE NH BYPASS FROM PANTHA CHOWK TO NOWGAM WHICH FORMS A PART OF FLOOD ABSORPTION BASIN.”
According to EPG, this makes the immediate question not whether engineering mitigation can be designed for the industrial park, but whether the proposed site falls within the area to which the SAC-imposed restriction applies and, if so, under what lawful authority development can now be contemplated.
The group said the matter cannot be approached merely as a question of obtaining a subsequent hydrological or drainage clearance. The statutory land-use status and hydrological function of the site must first be established, followed by a determination of whether development is legally and technically permissible.
EPG has called for the complete project footprint, cadastral boundaries and coordinates to be overlaid on a single GIS platform with Master Plan–2035 zoning, the SAC-protected Pantha Chowk–Nowgam corridor, September 2014 inundation data, notified or proposed flood-basin areas, Nowgam Jheel, the Jhelum floodplain, natural drainage channels and wetland areas.
An independent hydrological and hydraulic assessment should, EPG said, establish the site’s historical inundation, existing flood-storage volume, natural overland flow paths, relationship with Nowgam Jheel and adjoining wetlands, connection with the Jhelum and flood-spill system, existing drainage channels, pre- and post-development runoff, potential loss of flood-storage capacity and obstruction or diversion of flood flows. The assessment should also examine cumulative impacts of surrounding development and extreme rainfall and climate-change scenarios.
EPG said the guiding principle should be “No Net Loss of Flood Storage”. No development should be permitted if it results in a net reduction in flood-storage or flood-conveyance capacity. Where an intervention is otherwise legally permissible, compensatory storage should be demonstrated on the basis of hydraulic equivalence rather than merely equivalent area.
The group has called for status quo at the proposed site until its conformity with Master Plan–2035 and the SAC decision is established. It has also sought disclosure of the statutory basis, if any, under which development is being proposed within an area subject to the SAC-approved restriction.
If the site is confirmed to fall within the protected flood-absorption area, EPG said the Government should examine an alternative, hydrologically safer location for the industrial park rather than attempting to engineer away the area’s natural flood function.
EPG said the Nowgam case should also lead to broader measures for the Jhelum basin, including statutory floodplain zoning, protection of critical flood-storage areas from filling and permanent development, mandatory flood-risk assessment for major projects, and integrated storm-water and drainage planning before urban expansion or major infrastructure is sanctioned.
Floodplain, wetland and drainage layers should also be incorporated into Master Plans, zoning regulations, building byelaws and online building-permission systems, it said.
EPG further stated that it had prevailed upon the then Governor, Satya Pal Malik, at the final stage of the Master Plan–2035 process to ensure that the specific flood-absorption restriction was incorporated.
“Development must follow hydrology—not hydrology be engineered to accommodate development,” EPG said, stressing that floodplains and wetlands must be treated as essential public infrastructure rather than vacant land available for development.
Faiz Bakshi
Convenor- Environmental Policy Group( EPG)
