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Circumventing Environmental Regulations
The National Waterways Act, 2016 declared 111 rivers as National Inland Waterways. Even as these waterways open up for commercial shipping and navigation, and for interventions like dredging, river training, construction of terminals, and land acquisition, the legally binding regime of environmental clearance is evaded.
On 12 November 2018, Prime Minister Narendra Modi dedicated a multimodal terminal at Varanasi on the river Ganga to the nation. This terminal is a part of the ambitious Jal Marg Vikas Project (JMVP), also known as the Ganga Waterway or the National Waterway (NW) 1. The JMVP is the flagship project of the government’s massive National Inland Waterways (NIWs) programme. This programme is unfortunately being rolled out by bypassing the legally binding environmental clearance process, and twisting of laws to suit this end.
NIW Programme
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