SC clears Chardham project, which will connect 4 holy places in Uttarakhand

On August 16,2019, The Supreme Court(SC) bench comprising of Justices Rohinton Fali Nariman and Surya Kant has cleared the Chardham highway project, which will connect 4 holy places of Uttarakhand (Badrinath, Kedarnath, Gangotri and Yamunotri)through 900 km all-weather roads by modifying an NGT(National Green Tribunal) order to form  a committee to look into environmental concerns.Key points:
i. Members: The court also ordered Union Environment and Forest Ministry to form the fresh high-powered committee by August 22, 2019 with additional representatives from Physical Research Laboratory, Wildlife Institute of India and Defence Ministry.
ii.Rights: As per the order, the committee shall hold quarterly meetings to ensure compliance and may suggest any further measure after each review meeting & should consider whether revision of the full Chardham project should at all take place with a view to reducing the major impact on the environment.
iii.Time-limit: The committee has given 4 months to submit the report.
iv.Suggestion: It will also suggest the places in which afforestation should be taken and the kind of saplings to be planted. Further plantation should be taken place, in case of non-survival of any sapling, and compensatory afforestation should be 10 times the number of trees cut.
v. Background: The NGT had constituted a committee headed by Justice UC Dhyani , former Uttarakhand High Court Judge to oversee the project.
vi. Chardham Mahamarg Vikas Pariyojna:  It proposes to provide all-weather connectivity to four holy towns of Uttarakhand.
About Uttarakhand:
Capital: Dehradun
Governor :Baby Rani Maurya
Chief Minister: Trivendra Singh