New Delhi, March 15 The four-decade-old MC Mehta case finally came to a close on March 12 when the Supreme Court dismissed the 1985 Public Interest Litigation (PIL) concerning air pollution in Delhi and its surrounding areas.
The PIL, filed by environmentalist M C Mehta in 1985, led to several landmark judgments and orders aimed at preventing, controlling, and managing pollution levels in the Delhi-NCR region and related issues.
79-year-old Mahesh Chander Mehta is a lawyer who has been a prominent advocate for environmental conservation in various areas, including air pollution, pollution of the Ganga River, and the protection of the Taj Mahal.
Born on October 12, 1946, in a small village in the Rajouri district of Jammu and Kashmir, Mehta completed his primary education in Dhangri village and pursued higher education at a school in Rajouri.
He later moved to Jammu, where he earned a Postgraduate degree in Political Science and a Law degree from Jammu University. He began his legal practice at the Jammu and Kashmir High Court.
During his time in Jammu, Mehta actively participated in social and political issues, opposing corruption and encouraging students and youth to combat discrimination in the Jammu region. He served as president of The Youth Action Committee and championed various social and political causes.
Mehta began his career as a Supreme Court lawyer in 1983, when he migrated to Delhi, and shifted his focus to environmental litigation in 1984.
Over the years, Mehta has received numerous prestigious awards, including the Governor's Gold Medal, the Goldman Environmental Prize (often referred to as the alternative Nobel Prize in the USA and Europe), the UN's Global 500 Award in 1993, and the Magsaysay Award in 1997.
On March 12, a bench consisting of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi acknowledged that various applications had been filed regarding different issues in the MC Mehta PIL. The court had issued directions on those matters over time.
During a previous hearing, it was suggested by the parties involved that it was time to formally conclude the proceedings in the PIL and appropriately re-caption the petition.
"Taking into consideration these suggestions, we formally dispose of the writ petition," the bench said, adding that the apex court registry shall not entertain any interlocutory or miscellaneous applications in that petition.
"Instead, the registry is directed to register suo motu proceedings 'Re: Issues of air pollution in the National Capital Region'," the bench said.
It directed that all the pending applications be registered as writ petitions, assigning a separate writ petition number to each interlocutory application.