Cuttack, Aug. 10: A PIL filed in Orissa High Court has challenged the forest clearance granted to the proposed Posco Steel plant near Paradip in Jagatsinghpur district.

The PIL, filed by Debendra Kumar Jena and 12 other resident villagers of the Govindpur-Dhinkia area, have sought quashing of the forest clearance, alleging violation of the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights), Act.

The court has issued notices to the Centre and the state government for filing a reply within two weeks.

“The division bench of Chief Justice C. Nagappan and Justice Indrajit Mahanty, before which the PIL came up on Wednesday, posted the matter for hearing after two weeks while issuing notices to the secretary of the Union ministry of environment and forest and principal secretary of the state department of forest and environment,” petitioners’ counsel Kodanda Bhuyan said.

The project is proposed to be established in 1,620.49 hectares that include 1,253.22 hectares of forest land. The petition sought direction for implementation of the provisions of the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights), Act.

The petitioners claimed that they fulfilled the prescribed norms for being considered as Other Traditional Forest Dweller as they and the village community of Govindpur had been primarily residing in the forest land for more than 75 years prior to December 13, 2005. They were also purportedly dependent on the forest or forest land for livelihood needs and have been in occupation of the forest land before December 13, 2005.

The petitioners claimed that they would be affected in terms of livelihood and face displacement due to diversion of 1,253.22 hectares of forest land. Besides, their “legal rights” and their community were being sought to be denied as a result of the advancement of the project, the petition claimed alleging failure of the state machinery to determine and record their forest rights.

The petitioners sought direction to the state government “in the nature of prohibition” to stop work on the Posco project “until the recognition, vesting and settlement of rights of the petitioners are complete”.

The petition said that two independent investigation committees (one headed by former planning commission member N.C. Saxena and another by former ministry of environment and forest secretary Meena Gupta) had concluded violation of the Forest Rights Act in the project area.

The Forest Advisory Committee (under the Forest Conservation Act), a statutory review body of the Union ministry of environment and forests, had also concluded the same and recommended withdrawal of order for diversion of forest land, the petition said.