Ngt: Never Banned Petrol Boats At Lake | Kolkata News – Times of India

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[google-translator]

KOLKATA: The National Green Tribunal (NGT) on Monday cleared the only roadblock that had stopped resumption of rowing in Rabindra Sarobar for three and a half months. The eastern zone bench of NGT told the KMDA that the tribunal has never passed an order prohibiting petrol- or diesel-run rescue boats in the lake.

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“This lies exclusively within the domain of the KMDA,” observed the bench. The bench also asked KMDA to place the guideline for the clubs on the Lake premises.
Summarily rejecting the prayer to the tribunal for granting ‘no-objection’ to the rowing clubs at Rabindra Sarobar to operate petrol boats during rowing practice for rescue purposes, the bench of Justice B Amit Sthalekar (judicial member) and Saibal Gupta (expert member) said, “The letter dated May 18, 2022, written by the KMDA chief engineer to the rowing clubs, is absolutely misleading wherein it wrongly mentions that there will be a severe violation of NGT norms if the movement of diesel/petrol operated motorized boats are allowed.”
The Tribunal has never restrained KMDA or rowing clubs from operating rescue boats in the lake in question. Whether petrol boats should be permitted, if they are environmentally compliant, is a matter to be decided exclusively by KMDA along with the expert committee constituted by the Tribunal, the bench said.
On May 21, 2022, two students drowned in the lake during a storm while rowing a boat. Since May 22, rowing has been suspended in the lake by KMDA.
The bench has also asked the KMDA to frame guidelines for operation of the clubs in the area considering the recommendations of the expert committee and to periodically monitor their activities to ensure compliance. The KMDA shall ensure that the clubs do not have direct access to the lake area from their premises and are “separated by fences, if not already existing, with entries away from the lake side”.
Calcutta Rowing Club secretary Chandan Roychowdhury said, “It would be beneficial to rowing clubs with the national rowing championship round the corner. Rowers will have good practice at least for a few days.”
Debu Dutta of Lake Club said, “We are yet to receive a copy of the order. But we seek a quick direction from KMDA to withdraw the suspension of rowing in the lake.”
Rowing clubs had sought permission from KMDA — the custodian of the Lake — to allow training sessions to the group of rowers from Bengal who would be participating at the 36th national games to be held at Gujarat later this month. The clubs earlier conducted trial runs with battery-operated motorboats, but were unhappy with the results and petitioned KMDA to allow use of petrol boats. KMDA had said they would put the proposal before the NGT to ensure that Rabindra Sarobar’s environment wasn’t affected.
A KMDA official said they will go through the order and consult the expert committee to decide the course of action.
The order also asked the pollution control board to prepare an environment impact assessment report which will be published by the State Pollution Control Board.
The clubs had proposed to keep a petrol-operated high-speed rescue boat during training sessions for emergency rescue operations till the time a clear instruction was received from KMDA.

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