UDTR Global Rights of Nature Radar

The Ecocentric Illusion: How Section 20 of the NGT Act, 2010 and the Doctrine of Proportionality Structurally Preclude Rights of Nature in India

Identification

Public canonical key

doi:10.70798/ijomr/03010017

Authors

Munni Debnath Parial

Reported year

2026

Reported language

en

Source type

article

First detected

2026-11-09T19:04:47.542818+00:00

Last metadata observation

2026-11-10T16:58:51.492610+00:00

Last HTTP verification

Not checked

Documentary abstract — original language

The global Rights of Nature movement has gained significant momentum, with jurisdictions such as Ecuador and New Zealand, as countries, which formally recognising nature as a legal subject possessing enforceable rights.In India, the Uttarakhand High Court's 2017 declaration granting legal personhood to the rivers Ganga and Yamuna appeared to signal a transformative shift toward an ecocentric jurisprudence.However, the Supreme Court stayed this order within months, exposing the fragile institutional foundations upon which such declarations rest.Existing scholarship has largely focused on judicial activism and environmental governance, while insufficient attention has been paid to the structural incompatibility between India's environmental adjudicatory framework and Rights of Nature jurisprudence.This paper addresses that gap by arguing that the failure of ecocentric jurisprudence in India is not merely judicial but structurally integrated within the NGT Act, 2010.Specifically, Section 20, by mandating the polluter-pays principle and sustainable development, transforms ecological injury into compensable damage rather than recognising nature as an autonomous, rights-bearing entity.Furthermore, the NGT has systematically deployed the Doctrine of Proportionality to override the Precautionary Principle in infrastructure-sensitive cases, as evidenced by the Char Dham Highway Project and Great Nicobar Island Development Plan.Through doctrinal analysis of statutory provisions, NGT orders, and Supreme Court judgments, supplemented by comparative reference to Ecuador and New Zealand, this paper demonstrates that Rights of Nature in India remains aspirationally acknowledged but operationally impossible.The paper characterises India's ecocentric turn as an "ecocentric illusion" and concludes with recommendations for legislative reform and an independent guardianship mechanism.

Identifiers

DOI

10.70798/ijomr/03010017

OPENALEX

W7204989386

OPENAIRE

doi_________::dee9a8b168486929072658cc59abc27e

Documentary context

Documentary family

Scholarship

Source-reported types

Article · article

Jurisdictions studied — explicit sources

IN

Natural entities mentioned

River

Entity mentions are not evidence of legal recognition. Jurisdiction studied is separate from author affiliation country.

Sources

OpenAIRE · Record 1

OpenAlex · Record 1 · Record 2

• DOI · https://doi.org/10.70798/ijomr/03010017
• OpenAlex · https://openalex.org/W7204989386

Documented bibliographic relations

Source-declared references and links; they do not establish legal support or UGLC qualification. Up to 20 outgoing references are displayed.

• LA SENDA BIOCÉNTRICA: VALORES INTRÍNSECOS, DERECHOS DE LA NATURALEZA Y JUSTICIA ECOLÓGICA · CITES
• Environmental Justice in India: The National Green Tribunal and Expert Members · CITES
• Can Rights of Nature Make Development More Sustainable? Why Some Ecuadorian lawsuits Succeed and Others Fail · CITES
• Listening to Papatūānuku: a call to reform water law · CITES

0 incoming references within the detected corpus

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