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Synopsis

The Supreme Court has asked the Ministry of Environment Forest and Climate Change whether "Project Elephant" into a statutory agency, as per the recommendation made in the Gajah Report.

A CJI Chancrachud led bench posed this question while hearing a PIL seeking court's intervention in the issue of a large number of unnatural death of wild elephants due to electrocution from power lines passing through the protected areas and elephant reserves.

Court has accordingly said, “We direct that within four weeks the Ministry shall specifically respond to recommendation made in the ‘Gajah’ report of 2010 on conferring statutory status on the proposed body called National Elephant Conservation Authority."

Notably, the Ministry had filed a counter affidavit in the matter stating that while validating elephant corridors across the country, about 52% of the identified 88 corridor listed in the Gajah Report have been validated and the task of completing validation of the other corridors is under progress.

Court further noted that the MoEFCC had also constituted the Central Project Elephant Monitoring Committee for the purpose of monitoring and implementation of relevant directions and guidelines regarding the conservation and protection of elephants,

In this regard, the bench has asked the Ministry to submit an updated status report apprising the court of the progress which has been made.

The government has further informed Court that the elephant population has reached 29,964 (as per the census 2017), the elephant habitats are being consolidated, and Elephant Reserves area has been increased.

Moreover, the government emphasised before the bench that it was deeply committed to protect the safety of the elephants and continued to take various steps to prevent their death including electrocution. 

Case Title: Prerna Singh Bindra And Ors. vs. UoI And Ors.