Where the Law Is Going, and What a Student Should Watch

In one line

Six things in this book are changing now, and each has an instrument a reader can watch, so that these notes can be kept current without rewriting them.

This is the last chapter and it has a different job from the rest. Everything before it states the law as it stood when the book was written. This chapter names what is moving, so that a student reading it later knows which chapters to check.

One, ex post facto clearance

Where it stands. The judgment of 29 July 2026 holds that the prior clearance regime is mandatory and that the notification of 2006 does not accommodate a post facto clearance unless amended by an appropriate notification; that section 3 of the Act of 1986 permits a narrowly tailored, time-bound amnesty notification in supervening public interest; that the notification of 14 March 2017 is valid and the office memorandum of 7 July 2021 is quashed prospectively; and that no further application under either may be entertained.

What to watch. A notification under section 3 opening a fresh window. The judgment says in terms that the Central Government may do by notification what it may not do by administrative order, so the next move, if there is one, will be a draft notification under rule 5(3) with sixty days for objections.

Why it will change. The line moved four times between 2020 and 2026, and the pressure that produced each move has not gone.

Two, the assessment regime itself

Where it stands. The Environmental Impact Assessment Notification 2006, much amended.

What to watch. Any notification purporting to supersede it. The draft of 2020 was published under rule 5(3) and never finalised, and its three most contested proposals were a standing chapter for violation cases, annual rather than half-yearly compliance reporting, and a twenty-day public notice period instead of thirty. A future draft will be recognisable by whether it repeats them.

And the quieter thing to watch. Amendments to the Schedule, which change thresholds and categories without changing a word of the procedure, and amendments to the exclusions from public consultation.

Three, the penalty regime

Where it stands. Monetary penalties imposed by adjudicating officers since 1 April 2024 under the Environment (Protection) Act 1986, the Air Act 1981 and the Public Liability Insurance Act 1991, with appeals to the National Green Tribunal on a ten per cent deposit; and the Jan Vishwas (Amendment of Provisions) Act 2026 reducing three sentences in the Disaster Management Act from 15 May 2026.

What to watch. Three things. Whether a third Jan Vishwas Act reaches further environmental provisions. Whether the Environmental Protection Fund under section 15E and section 16 begins to publish what it holds and how it is spent. And whether anybody publishes the number of adjudications and the sums recovered, which is the only evidence that can settle whether the reform worked.