All states and UTs to accord top priority to wetland demarcation: MoEFCC affidavit

The National Wetlands Committee has decided to direct all states and Union territories to accord “top priority” to comply with the Supreme Court order on completing ground truthing and demarcation of wetlands, the Union environment ministry informed the Supreme Court on Monday. This follows an earlier office memorandum, issued by the ministry on December 24, to chief secretaries/administrators of all states to furnish the time-bound action plans by December 31, the MoEFCC said in an affidavit filed in the court Monday, ahead of a hearing in a key case on the status of wetlands in the top court on Tuesday. The court on December 11 said that “each of the State/UT Wetland Authorities shall complete ground truthing as well as the demarcation of wetland boundaries of each of the Wetland which have been identified for their State by Space Application Centre Atlas, 2021 as expeditiously as possible, but definitely within a period of three months from 11.12.2024.” The decision on seeking the compliance reports was taken during a meeting of the NWC on December 27, the affidavit said, further listing out the other decision taken at the meeting. The States and Union Territories were requested to update their present status on the ground-truthing and demarcation of wetland boundaries in the designated Google sheet and upload the data in the Save Wetlands Campaign Portal,” the affidavit said.