India is undergoing one of the largest expansions of infrastructure in history. Growth-oriented economic and geopolitical objectives include the ₹11 lakh crore National Infrastructure Pipeline, the PM Gati Shakti initiative, renewable energy parks, river-linking projects, expressways, ports, and mining development. The government says the projects are crucial for building a developed India by 2047, as well as for boosting energy security, bettering logistics, and attracting global investment. But there’s another trend that can’t be ignored, alongside the infrastructure boom. Environmental demonstrations are no longer isolated events but are now a recurrent feature of India’s development landscape. Local communities, environmental groups, and even scientific institutions are increasingly challenging projects that have already received statutory approvals. Examples include the Ken-Betwa River Link Project, the Great Nicobar megadevelopment, the Hasdeo Arand coal mines, the Aarey Forest controversy in Mumbai, hydropower projects in Uttarakhand, and the Niyamgiri mining dispute in Odisha. The common denominator is not dislike of growth per se. Instead, there is growing distrust of India’s Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) process. This is perhaps the biggest conundrum in the current environmental administration in India. In a bid to hasten clearances and reduce regulatory hurdles, the country may be slowing down infrastructure development by weakening the institution it created to build public trust. A poor EIA does not help the environment but only postpones the problems to a later date when they re-emerge in protests, litigation, and political confrontation.

The Environmental Impact Assessment was introduced worldwide as a preventive planning tool, not an environmental veto. The idea was enshrined in the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) of 1969, which required federal agencies to consider environmental impacts before decisions. Since then, the EIA has become a global norm, with more than 190 countries recognizing the EIA as an important tool for sustainable development. The Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) was legally introduced in India with the EIA Notification of 1994 in the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, and further improved by EIA Notification of 2006. The framework requires scientific evaluation, public consultation, and expert review before any project can be granted environmental clearance. But in reality, India’s EIA system has slowly morphed into what many environmental researchers call a “clearance-oriented” rather than a “assessment-oriented” regime. Ultimately, most projects seeking environmental clearance do get clearance, raising the question of whether the process is really verifying environmental risks or just facilitating administrative approvals. The structural deficiencies of the EIA system in India are well documented. Most evaluations are carried out by private consultants who are directly and solely engaged and compensated by project proponents, leading to an inherent conflict of interest. Baseline ecological surveys are generally conducted over short periods and fail to capture seasonal changes in biodiversity, hydrology, and wildlife movement. It is still uncommon to include cumulative environmental impacts in decision-making. Projects are typically assessed individually, regardless of the fact that they belong to interconnected ecosystems. Monitoring after the clearance also is weak, relying mostly on self-reporting by project developers and limited regulatory oversight.

The 2020 Draft EIA Notification has added to the concerns. Environmental experts, legal scholars, and civil society organizations argued that provisions for post-facto environmental clearances, expanding exemptions from public consultation, and easing compliance reporting risked undermining environmental governance at a time when stronger institutions are needed to address climate change. While the notification is being reviewed, the discussion has brought into focus the increasing mistrust between the regulatory bodies and the common man. This gap now shows up in India’s environmental conflicts. A fine illustration of this is the Ken-Betwa River Link Project. The first project under India’s National Perspective Plan for river interlinking, it is to transfer water from the Ken River to the water-scarce Betwa basin, offering irrigation benefits, drinking water, and hydropower generation in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, respectively. The proposal, however, has been repeatedly criticized by conservation biologists, hydrologists, and local populations. The Daudhan Dam, the showpiece of the project, will inundate approximately 9,000 hectares of land, of which about 6,000 hectares fall in the Panna Tiger Reserve. Scientists have questioned assumptions about surplus river flows, especially in the light of changing climatic circumstances, and conservationists say wildlife corridors, riverine biodiversity, and downstream ecological processes have not been fully evaluated. Despite the formal environmental clearance, the project continues to face public opposition, as many stakeholders are skeptical that the environmental assessment sufficiently identified long-term ecological dangers. The proposed Great Nicobar Development Project presents a similar governance challenge. From a strategic point of view, the project is very important for India’s Indo-Pacific ambitions, as it involves the development of a transshipment port, international airport, township, and supporting infrastructure. Great Nicobar is ecologically one of India’s most vulnerable biodiversity hotspots, with endemic rainforest habitats, reefs of coral, leatherback turtle nesting beaches, and indigenous populations like the Shompen and Nicobarese.

The opposition to the project has less to do with its strategic necessity than the quality of the environmental review. Independent scientists have questioned biodiversity surveys, cumulative effect assessments, catastrophe risk assessments, and the treatment of indigenous ecological knowledge within the EIA process. Once again environmental clearance has not found favor with the public. Odisha’s environmental conflicts are perhaps the most enduring case of how ineffective environmental governance can engender long-term social resistance. The Dongria Kondh people's resistance to bauxite mining in their sacred hills ignited the Niyamgiri movement that transformed Indian environmental policy. While the fight was about indigenous rights, it also highlighted wider flaws in environmental assessments, such as a lack of understanding of ecological dependency, forest livelihoods, and cultural landscapes. The Supreme Court’s ruling on the permission of projects by Gram Sabhas had a significant influence on environmental governance in India, recognizing the fact that ecological legitimacy is inherently tied with community participation. Another example is the Hasdeo Arand woods in Chhattisgarh. Local communities have repeatedly opposed proposed coal mining projects, arguing that environmental assessments do not account for the ecological importance of one of the largest contiguous forests in central India, an important elephant corridor and a key source of income for indigenous peoples. India’s mining sector is similarly affected, with project-level studies generally ignoring landscape-level ecological interconnectedness. The Himalayas underscore perhaps the greatest flaw of India’s current EIA framework: the inability to sufficiently evaluate cumulative impacts. Hydropower projects, roadways, and tunnels are often evaluated separately, though they all impact very vulnerable mountain ecosystems. Several expert panels had recommended cumulative effect studies for Himalayan rivers following the deadly Kedarnath floods in 2013. However, environmental clearances continue to be given largely within project boundaries, even as landslides, glacial retreat, and extreme rainfall events are occurring with greater frequency and highlighting the need for an integrated approach to environmental planning. The Indian experience is contrary to emerging international practice. Under Canada’s Impact Assessment Act of 2019, federal assessments must look at environmental impacts, Indigenous rights, climate commitments, sustainability goals, and social equity. Indigenous consultation takes place across all project planning and is not limited to one public hearing. For example, in the European Union, member states must assess cumulative impacts, biodiversity, climate adaptation, and project alternatives before a project is approved under the Environmental Impact Assessment Directive. The Aarhus Convention further strengthens public engagement by providing citizens with wide access to environmental information and decision-making.

Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Australia’s conservation framework: all projects affecting habitats protected at the national level should also be subject to a thorough biodiversity assessment. A number of major mining and infrastructure projects were redesigned or had additional mitigation after independent ecological studies prior to approval. Even the United States, a country criticized for its long environmental assessment processes, acknowledges the need of procedural legitimacy. NEPA requires federal agencies to disclose environmental impacts, consider reasonable alternatives, and explain their ultimate decisions. There will always be conflicts, but the process has built in transparency, which often reduces accusations of behind-the-scenes decisions. What these countries suggest is not that more rigorous EIAs inhibit growth. Instead, they demonstrate that credible environmental governance, prior to construction, reduces uncertainty, improves project design, and fosters public trust. Therefore, robust environmental assessments should be seen as an investment in policy stability, not a regulatory hurdle. Climate change makes this responsibility all the more urgent. The EIA framework in India continues to be based on historical baselines of the environment, although rainfall patterns have become more variable, and there is glacier retreat, sea-level rise, high heat, and changing river hydrology. Infrastructure built for yesterday’s environmental conditions may become increasingly vulnerable to tomorrow’s climate realities. Hence, the incorporation of climate risk assessments in EIAs is no longer an option but a must. Reforming India’s environmental assessment process needs more than just procedural changes. It needs to be reorganized. Environmental assessments should be commissioned by an independent public body, not the project developers themselves. Ecologically interrelated areas such as river basins, mountain ranges, and forest corridors shall require cumulative effects evaluations. Public participation should take place as part of project planning and not after major investment decisions are taken. “Compliance monitoring should be based on independent audits, satellite technology, and publicly available environmental data, not developer self-reporting. Finally, India’s environmental problems are not just about conflicts over forests, rivers, or wildlife. They are a more serious crisis of institutional confidence.

For the country to become a developed economy, it needs to build a lot of infrastructure. But being successful in development isn’t just about speed. Rarely are projects that get fast-tracked environmental permits only to be bogged down by protests, lawsuits, and political opposition economically efficient. The Ken-Betwa, Great Nicobar, Niyamgiri, Hasdeo Arand, and Himalayan protests reveal a fundamental, and increasingly vital, truth. When environmental assessments do not generate public trust, residents look to streets and courtrooms as alternative venues of environmental governance. For India, the debate about whether to pursue development is over. The question is whether development can proceed with institutions that are scientifically rigorous, transparent, and trusted by the people whose landscapes they want to improve. In the decades ahead, the credibility of India’s environmental impact assessment system may be as important as the infrastructure projects it is meant to assess.