How the Right Was Built, Case by Case

In one line

MU asks whether a pollution-free environment is an integral part of the right to life under Article 21, and the answer is yes, but the interesting part is that the courts got there over eleven years and mostly through High Courts first.

An answer that names four cases in no particular order is an average answer. An answer that puts them in date order and says what each one added is a distinctly better one, because it shows a development rather than a list.

1980: the beginning, without Article 21

Municipal Council, Ratlam v. Shri Vardhichand, AIR 1980 SC 1622. Residents of a ward complained that the municipality had built no drains, that effluent from an alcohol plant ran through the streets, and that in the absence of public conveniences the poor used the road. A magistrate ordered the municipality under section 133 of the Code of Criminal Procedure to build drains and remove the nuisance. The municipality pleaded want of funds.

Held, the order stood. A statutory body cannot plead want of funds against a duty imposed on it for the protection of public health, and Article 47 makes the improvement of public health among the State's primary duties.

What it added. The first case in which the Supreme Court made a public authority spend money to abate an environmental harm. It contains no Article 21 holding, and it is important not to claim one. It got there under a criminal procedure section and a Directive Principle, which is why it has its own chapter.

1985: the environment reaches Article 32

Rural Litigation and Entitlement Kendra v. State of Uttar Pradesh, AIR 1985 SC 652. A letter from a voluntary organisation about unsafe limestone quarrying in the Dehradun and Mussoorie hills was treated as a writ petition under Article 32. The Court appointed the Bhargava Committee and then a Working Group, and ordered the dangerous quarries closed.

Held, closure would cause hardship to lessees and workers, but that was "a price that has to be paid for protecting and safeguarding the right of the people to live in a healthy environment with minimal disturbance of the ecological balance".

What it added. Two things. It is the first environmental case in the Supreme Court under Article 32, and the phrase "the right of the people to live in a healthy environment" is used. But the Court did not say which Article that right came from. The inference was made by somebody else, two years later.

September 1986: a duty becomes a right

L.K. Koolwal v. State of Rajasthan, AIR 1988 Raj 2, decided 19 September 1986. Citizens of Jaipur complained about the city's sanitation, with affidavits from residents of each locality. The municipality pleaded shortage of funds and staff.