From Kancha Gachibowli to Aravali to Hasdeo, people came in large numbers to protest against the dangers of mining and deforestation in the year 2025. While the Supreme Court order on retrospective environmental clearance triggered debate on the basic principles of environmental jurisprudence, the government’s policy on nuclear mineral mining was found to be in conflict with the interests of ecologically fragile and highly vulnerable coastal lands.
Protest over Centre’s new definition of Aravalli hills
Supreme Court approves new uniform definition of Aravalli hills and ranges Large-scale protests began in Rajasthan, Delhi and Haryana in December.
As per the new definition, “Aravalli Hill” will be defined as any landform with a local relief of 100 meters or more in the specified Aravali districts and “Aravalli Range” will be a collection of two or more such hills within 500 meters of each other. The bench accepted the recommendations for sustainable mining and steps to be taken to stop illegal mining in the Aravalli hills and ranges.
Protesters fear that this new definition protects only hills more than 100 meters high from mining, and will leave the remaining hills – a 700-km range stretching from Haryana to Gujarat, much of which is in Rajasthan – vulnerable to mining.
Also read: Despite efforts of more than a year, the government failed to define Aravali
The Supreme Court on December 29… Kept in abeyanceThe November 20 decision upheld the definition of the government expert panel on the Aravalis.
Students display banners during a protest for the protection of the Aravalli hills at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, Saturday, December 27, 2025 | Photo courtesy: PTI
Students protest to save Kancha Gachibowli forest in Hyderabad
In March 2025, Students of University of Hyderabad (UoH) started protesting. Kancha against the auction of 400 acres of Gachibowli forest land. The students said the land belonged to the university, a claim the government vehemently rejected.
Environmentalists said the land is home to a rich diversity of native flora and fauna. He pointed to the lack of necessary permissions for cutting greenery and the absence of environmental impact assessment which is mandatory for such projects.
In April, the Supreme Court banned the clearing of forest areas. And directed the Telangana Wildlife Warden to take immediate steps to protect the wildlife affected by the destruction of 100 acres of Kancha Gachibowli “forest” area, telling the state government that there cannot be “high-rise buildings in the company of deer”.
BJP and Congress stalwarts also join environmentalists to protect the Himalayas
In September 2025, many environmentalists and scientists including veteran BJP leader and former Union Human Resource Development Minister Murli Manohar Joshi and veteran Congress leader and Rajya Sabha member Karan Singh. appealed to the supreme court To review its 2021 decision allowing Himalayan roads to be wider than 5.5 metres, part of the Chardham project.
Under the supervision of the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, the project includes widening of the hill roads leading to the Bhagirathi Eco Sensitive Zone and India’s border with China.
However, environmentalists have argued that cutting into mountain slopes and the resulting debris is harmful to the ecosystem and worsens the effects of landslides and torrential rains as well as causing massive blockages and pile-ups on these mountain roads.
Large scale cutting of hills near Rudraprayag for Chardham project, two lanes of National Highway with minimum width of 10 meters is proposed. The Char Dham project involves the widening and repair of 889 km of national highways leading to the iconic temples of Kedarnath, Badrinath, Gangotri and Yamunotri in Uttarakhand. , Photo Courtesy: Krishnan VV
Supreme Court withdraws decision on retrospective environmental clearance
The Supreme Court, in a majority decision on November 18, 2025, Recalled its May 16 decision who announced the grant retrospective Or that retrospective environmental clearance by the Center for construction projects and constructions was a “gross illegality” and a “blight”.
Justice Ujjwal Bhuyan recorded a sharp dissent in his 97-page opinion. He called the review decision an “innocent expression of opinion” that ignored “the basic principles of environmental jurisprudence”.
The May judgment had said that granting any form of retrospective approval to regularize illegal constructions was clearly illegal.
in an editorial The Hindu states usa Ex post facto sanction can only impose fines, prescribe mitigation or order closure or demolition.
Nuclear mineral mining exempted from public consultation
The Impact Assessment Division of the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change announced through an office memorandum in September 2025 that public consultation is not required for projects of mining of atomic minerals notified in Part B and critical and strategic minerals notified in Part D of the First Schedule of the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin urges Prime Minister Narendra Modi To withdraw the Office Memorandum expressing its concern for the rare earth elements inherent in the ecologically fragile and highly sensitive beach sand systems in coastal Tamil Nadu.
In a written reply in the Lok Sabha, Union Minister of State for Environment Kirti Vardhan Singh informed the state government in December 2025 that the exemption was issued under the pre-existing provision of the EIA notification, section 7(III)(i)(f), which allows projects related to national defence, security or other strategic considerations to be exempted from public consultation.
Forest clearance for mining project in Hasdev
In August 2025, Chhattisgarh government approves forest clearance for a mining project In the ecologically sensitive Hasdeo Forest. The project potentially paves the way for the felling of 4.5 lakh trees, which has been criticized by opposition parties and environmentalists.
Demanding its cancellation, the opposition has accused the ruling BJP of sacrificing the interests of the people of the state as well as ecological concerns “for the benefit of its capitalist friends”.
Local residents submitted 1,623 individual objection letters during the public hearing for environmental clearance.
In 2022, the Chhattisgarh Legislative Assembly unanimously passed a private member’s resolution urging the Center to cancel the allocation of all coal mining blocks in the ecologically sensitive area of Hasdeo Aranya.
Protests against mining and resulting deforestation in the Hasdeo forest began in 2011 when the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change approved mining for the coal block. According to the People’s Union for Civil Liberties, the Government of India has identified 23 coal blocks within the forest area.
The protest site at the entrance of Hariharpur village, where Hasdev Arand Bachao Sangharsh Samiti is gathering every day from March 2, 2022. Muneshwar Singh Porte, member of the committee in white shirt and resident of Fattepur village. , Photo Credit: AMFaruki
Revocation and ‘disappearance’ of forest rights of villagers in Chhattisgarh
The role of forest dwellers and tribal communities is often ignored when talking about forest conservation.
In October 2025, the Chhattisgarh High Court has rejected a petition challenging the cancellation of the community Forest rights given to villagers of Ghatbarra of Hasdev Aranya forest area Where the entity owned by Adani Enterprises is operating the Parsa East and Kete Besan coal mines.
In 2016, the district-level committee (DLC) in Surguja district canceled the community forest rights title rights granted in 2013, finding that it was granted by mistake because the piece of land fell under mining areas, for which diversion of the forest had already been approved in 2012.
The Forest Rights Act, 2006 recognizes and vests forest use rights in Scheduled Tribes and other forest-dwelling communities.
in August, The Hindu informed Thousands of forest rights pattas distributed in at least three districts of Chhattisgarh appear to have gone missing from the records of the tribal welfare department of the state government at various points in the last 17 months. According to the FRA, once titles are granted, they are neither transferable nor transferable, but can only be inherited.
Protest against Siang Upper Multipurpose Project (SUMP) in Arunachal Pradesh
Villagers of three districts of Central Arunachal Pradesh In May 2025, started an indefinite strike against the 11,000 MW Siang Upper Multi-Purpose Project. Villagers stopped pre-feasibility report and survey work for the hydropower project. The protesting women said the project would take away their ancestral land and livelihood. The villagers said they had been protesting against the dams since the early 1980s under the banner of the Siang Indigenous Farmers Forum.
Protest against coal mining turns violent in Surguja, Chhattisgarh
Violence broke out when villagers protested Against mining in Surguja, Chhattisgarh in December 2025. The protesters, residents of Parsodi Kala village, were protesting against the Amera Expansion Coal Project of South Eastern Coalfields Limited, a subsidiary of Coal India Limited. The protesters accused him of land grabbing.
Some protesters said that land for agriculture was their only source of livelihood and it was being taken away, which they protested against. Protester Lilavati said that she will not give her land. “We love our land and don’t want to give it away. SECL will get the coal, but what will happen to us?”
Fear of ‘irreversible’ impact on Great Nicobar Island project
In October 2025, more than 70 scholars, former bureaucrats, activists, lawyers and environmentalists wrote a Open letter in defense of Environment Minister Bhupendra Yadav The minister was urged to “put aside political considerations” and focus on the “serious and irreversible negative impacts” of the project on the proposed ₹92,000 crore Great Nicobar Island mega-infrastructure project.
The Great Nicobar Project involves the construction of a trans-shipment port, an international airport, a township and a power plant on more than 160 square km of land.
Also read:Great Nicobar Island Project: Map ready for denotification of tribal reserve
The signatories alleged that the Environmental Assessment Committee ignored anthropological and ecological objections.
The Hindu It was reported that the Tribal Council of Little Nicobar and Great Nicobar A complaint to the Tribal Affairs Minister in August 2025 said forest clearance for the project was granted through misrepresentation by the Andaman and Nicobar Islands administration to the Centre, claiming that the rights of tribal people under the Forest Rights Act, 2006 had been “recognized and dealt with”.
