The Expert Appraisal Committee of the MoEFCC rejected Kerala's plea for environmental clearance without holding a public hearing.
The ship that brought gantry cranes to Vizhinjam from China was accorded a grand welcome. (Supplied)
In an apparent setback to the international transhipment terminal port near the Kerala capital, the Union Ministry of Environment, Forests, and Climate Change (MoEFCC) asked the Vizhinjam International Seaport Limited (VISL) to hold a mandatory public hearing before commencing the second and third phases of the project.
The development is seen as a moral victory for the local fishermen community around the port in Thiruvananthapuram, whose lives and livelihoods have been jeopardised by the project’s location at a high-risk zone.
The project is being implemented in partnership with the Adani Ports and SEZ Ltd.
The fishermen have been on a warpath against the project that they claim is causing sea erosion, and destroying their houses and livelihood. Several of them have been living in relief camps and rented accommodation.
The public hearing would allow the affected people to list the hardships they are facing due to the port’s construction. Several coastal families north of the under-construction port have lost their homes, boats, and land for drying fishing nets to sea erosion.
Two of the city’s prominent tourist spots, Kovalam and Shanghumugham Beach, too, have suffered mainly due to the construction of the 3.2 km breakwater. The fishermen expressed fear that the erosion would aggravate once the breakwater is completed.
While locations north of the Vizhinjam port have been facing erosion risk, areas to the south confront sea accretion as soil and sand accumulate in those parts.
Priests protest against Vizhinjam port in 2022
Local fish workers staged massive protests against the project last year, pointing to its environmental and livelihood implications, but the state administration quashed the movement by December. The protests often witnessed violent incidents.
With most political parties backing the project, the Latin Catholic Church, which spearheaded the protests, found itself left alone.
The VISL sought exemption and environmental clearance on 3 August, fearing further protests would follow the public hearing before the next phases.
Adani Ports and SEZ Ltd., which is constructing the project in a public-private partnership with the Union and state governments, has also sought to skip the hearing and sought immediate approval.
According to government sources, the appeal in this regard was forwarded to the MoEFCC’s Expert Appraisal Committee (EAC), which rejected the demand. The existing clearance covered only the first phase and it would expire on 3 January, 2024.
Reliable sources told South First the EAC dismissed the request, stating that further phases would be permitted only after a public hearing.
VISL claimed in its application that the expansion works would be carried out entirely on land already acquired for the project and that no new land acquisition was necessary for the second and third stages.
It further stated that funds for setting up backup and ancillary facilities were secured as part of the first phase of development, for which a public hearing was held before the start of construction.
The VISL position was that the entire project area of 450.09 hectares remained the same, so holding another public hearing would be a waste of time and resources. It also argued that the hearing would further complicate the already delayed works.
It further stated that the public hearing held on 3 January, 2014, for obtaining the initial clearance was based on the whole master plan and was not limited to phase one.
Boats being taken to the state secretariat as part of the protest against the Vizhinjam port being constructed by the Adani group. A 2022 file picture(South First)
In response, EAC acknowledged that the extension would take place within the existing port limits but noted that the additional components, particularly the construction of new berths in the remaining phases, would change the “configuration of the project” and, as a result, a public hearing was required.
People living north of the project site, and environmentalists had expressed concern about possible erosion during the 2014 hearing.
The first draft of the project’s Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) report included a chapter on coastline erosion, noting that areas north of the Vizhinjam fishing harbour have begun to erode since its construction in 1970.
The chapter was based on an investigation conducted by an expert agency, the Asian Consulting Agency.
It also referred to earlier studies that discovered the erosion of northern areas where construction was carried out into the sea.
This prompted locals and concerned experts to raise the issue in the public hearing. Authorities eventually withdrew this part, stating that the Asian Consulting Agency was incompetent to conduct the study.
The ministry has also directed the VISL to include public concerns as well as the obligations of project proponents in the amended EIA report that would be presented to secure the second environmental clearance.
The updated terms of reference (ToR) have asked the VISL to conduct an “erosion and accretion study” near the project site at the mouth of the local stream.
The ToR also intends to address another major local issue. It requests that the VISL study the project’s impact on marine ecology and biodiversity, focusing on the corals, mangroves, and mud flats surrounding the project site.
These findings will be incorporated into the amended EIA, forming the basis for the European Commission’s grant for the next phase of Vizhinjam port construction.
The present clearance was to expire on 29 December 2020 but was extended till 3 January 2024 considering the Covid-19 scenario.
Despite the government’s expectation that commercial operations will begin in the first half of 2024, just 65.46 percent of phase one work has been completed. Around 70 percent of dredging and reclamation was also completed.
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