Context:

Environmental activist censored for encouraging public participation in consultation process of Drafting of Environment Impact Assessment Notification 2020.

Environment Impact Assessment (EIA)

• Environmental Impact Assessment or EIA is the process or study which predicts the effect of a proposed industrial/infrastructural project on the environment.
• It prevents the proposed activity/project from being approved without proper oversight or taking adverse consequences into account.
• Under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, India notified its first EIA norms in 1994, setting in place a legal framework for regulating activities that access, utilise, and affect (pollute) natural resources.
• The 1994 EIA notifi cation was replaced with a modifyed draft in 2006. Earlier this year, the government redrafted it again to incorporate the amendments and relevant court orders issued since 2006, and to make the EIA “process more transparent and expedient.”