The Full Story

Introduction

The Centre for Environment Law, Policy and Research, established in August 2016, seeks to promote legal education, research and extension activities in the field of Environmental Law. The Centre aims to take up projects that shall herald the confluence of academic and expert insights on environmental issues pertinent to contemporary times. A major goal of the Centre is to support academic and policy-oriented dialogue that paves the way to critical insights and constructive outcomes in the area of environmental law.

Objectives

1. To encourage, popularize and disseminate information on contemporary environmental issues, affecting our common future.

1. To collaborate and provide a forum for mutual exchange of ideas and promote public participation on key issues of the environment.

1. To enable and empower through various means, including legal aid, the marginalized and weaker sections of the society who disproportionately bear the brunt of environmental degradation.

1. To take up legal issues of environmental concern for perusal at relevant forums.

1. To pursue various academic and research endeavors for the promotion of law and policy reform on the environmental theme.

To these ends, we seek to engage with a broad spectrum of lawyers, academicians, governmental and non-governmental organizations, communities, corporates, think tanks and experts working in the field of environment. The activities of the Centre are primarily student-driven, and facilitated by faculty members.

Activities

• Seminars/ Conferences/ Training Workshops-

The centre is involved in conducting conferences, seminars and workshops to encourage informative discussions on substantive as well as procedural aspects of Environmental Law. Such engagements are highly beneficial towards enhancing the environmental expertise of budding lawyers, researchers as well as scholars.

• Analysis of Environmental Laws and Policies-

The Centre plans to undertake research work to examine the efficacy of the existing domestic environmental laws. This study shall include a critical analysis of environmental jurisprudence developed by the Hon’ble Supreme Court since the mid-1980s as well as the National Green Tribunal since 2010.

• Preparation of Database-

In order to bring forward specific issues regarding environmental protection and sustainable development, it is important to connect with all the stakeholders. With this view, the Centre is preparing an exhaustive database that shall include nationally/internationally renowned academicians, legal scholars, Governmental experts, NGOs, Social Activists, representatives from Corporate Sector, etc.

• Corporate Panel on Environmental Sustainability-

The Corporate Sector is one of the stakeholders in terms of carbon emissions.Thus, it is imperative to provide a platform for the corporate sector to engage in effective discussions with respect to the issues of implementation and compliance of environmental laws and regulations facing this sector. In furtherance of this, the Centre intends to organize a ‘Corporate Summit’ on an annual basis, in the near future.

The Centre seeks to initiate a ‘Corporate Panel on Environmental Sustainability’ that shall provide a meaningful platform for dynamic interaction between the industry and academic segments, thereby making these linkages more robust and discernible.

• NLUD Newsletter on Environment-

In due course of time, the Centre plans to launch a quarterly newsletter on various emerging themes of environmental law, that include, inter alia, national and international news on environmental law, recent judgments and scholarly articles on environmental law.

• Blog 

The Blog would be centred around looking at Environment Law and Policy, with special reference given to the emerging discourse on Climate Change. It would also encourage and consider work that cut across multiple disciplines. The intention of such interdisciplinarity is two-fold. Firstly, the blog does not wish to be exclusionary in limiting the disciplinary background of the authors. Secondly, the blog wishes to expose the readers to a wider array of information to contemplate and engage with.

• Collective for Environmental Action (CEA)-

The Collective for Environmental Action, launched under the aegis of the Centre, provides an avenue for the student body to channelize efforts on environmental issues, with special emphasis on policy and climate change issues. The collective, while closely cooperating with the Centre, aims to raise awareness about climate change, through regular reading circles and the CEA blog, amongst others. The collective, in the near future, plans to conduct an e-survey of the carbon footprints of higher education institutions across India, starting with the Delhi-NCR region.