Introduction
“Environmental law enforcement must be one of the highest priorities of government.” -Joko Widodo (President of Indonesia)
India is now facing a number of issues relating to environment and with time we have widened the scope of statutory laws and justice. The environmental law as it is known today is an amalgamation of common law and statutory principles. Interestingly, there were provisions dealing with contamination of environment in common law even before the specific laws were introduced. In common law, pollution cases generally fall under four categories. They are Nuisance, Trespass, Negligence and Strict liability. The dominant water law theories and the public trust doctrine also had influence on the use of staple resources of water and land.
According to the Cambridge dictionary, Nuisance means ‘something which annoys you or causes trouble to you’ and can be categorized as of two types of nuisance namely private nuisance and public nuisance. Here, the concept of environmental law covers the public nuisance and defined as ‘which affects at the same time an entire community or neighbourhood, or any considerable number of persons, although the extent of the annoyance or damage inflicted upon individuals may be unequal.’ And as the addition of undesirable substances into the environment is not only a part of nuisance but it can introduce an irreversible condition which shall be harm to all the beings on planet. Therefore this issue has been categorized into a crime under the penal code.
Trespass implies a purposeful intrusion of the interests of the offended party over the property in his restrictive belonging. The attack might be immediate or through some unmistakable article. Two things are important to demonstrate for comprising the tort of trespass which is Intentional obstruction and this obstruction must be immediate as opposed to important. It varies from the disturbance in that; trespass is significant fundamentally while aggravation is noteworthy in the verification of harm. In the earth related issues tort of trespass establishes a conscious situation of waste in such conditions as it will be conveyed to the place that is known for offended party by common powers.
Negligence is another particular tort on which a precedent-based law activity to counteract ecological contamination can be initiated. When there is an obligation to fare thee well and the equivalent isn’t taken, which results in some damage to someone else, it is added up to carelessness. In the activity of carelessness, the outcome is some sort of a misfortune, burden or inconvenience to another. The offended party must show that the litigant was under an obligation to take sensible consideration to evade the harm grumbled and there’s a Breach of the obligation causing Consequential harm which probably been authentically brought about by the rupture of obligation and must be sensibly predictable as an outcome of the break.
The issue with instances of carelessness is the trouble in setting up easy going the association between the careless demonstration of one and damage to other people. It is likewise troublesome and hazardous to demonstrate if the impact of the damage stays covered up for a significant stretch.
Strict liability is about an individual who, for his own motivation, expedites his property and gathers and keeps there anything liable to do evil on the off chance that it get away, must keep it in at his hazard, and in the event that he doesn’t do so is at first sight responsible for all the harm which is the regular outcome of its departure. The risk under this standard is exacting and it isn’t the barrier that the thing escapes without that people unyielding act, default or carelessness or that he had no information of its reality. The doctrine of strict liability is otherwise called the rule of no-fault liability as it thinks about obligation without deficiency with respect to the litigant and especially this part of the principle has critical significance in the issues identified with ecological contamination. it is identified with assortment of things like fire, gas, blasts, power, oil, harmful vapour, colliery ruin, toxic vegetation and so forth this standard is similarly applies to the wounds caused to individual and property.
Environmental Crime
Environmental crimes refer to the infringement of laws expected to ensure the condition and human wellbeing. These laws administer air and water quality and direct the manners by which the transfer of waste and risky materials can lawfully occur. People or enterprises can be seen as liable of Environmental crimes. Environmental criminal law is the result of a legal evolutionary ”process of transformation in response to the public’s desire to have a legal system that better reflects the public’s environmental protection goals.’ Criminalizing environmental infractions and seeking appropriate sanctions for serious norm violations of a nation’s laws that seek to protect public health and •natural resources is a vital role for government to play in a democratic polity. This is the overarching logic of national environmental criminal law. However there is an attending overall point of confinement also: appropriate mix of two unmistakable assortments of law ecological rules and criminal approvals into a fair mosaic of clear authorization, impartial requirement, and reasonable development. In this regard, the legislature, the executive branch, and the judiciary should, ‘in their respective spheres of responsibility, consider the nature, aims, and limits of criminal law and how they relate to the underlying substantive offenses defined in the environmental statutes.’
Environmental crime is an illegal act which directly harms the environment. International bodies such as the G8, Interpol, European Union, United Nations Environment Programme and the United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute have recognised Illegal wildlife trade in endangered species in contravention to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Fauna and Flora (CITES); Smuggling of ozone-depleting substances (ODS) in contravention to the 1987 Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer; Dumping and illicit trade in hazardous waste in contravention of the 1989 Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movement of Hazardous Wastes and Other Wastes and their Disposal; Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing in contravention to controls imposed by various regional fisheries management organisations; Illegal logging and the associated trade in stolen timber in violation of national laws as environmental crimes. These crimes are liable for prosecution. Interpol facilitates international police cooperation and assists its member countries in the effective enforcement of national and international environmental laws and treaties. Interpol began fighting environmental crime in 1992.
Environmental Protection Under IPC
The history of Indian Penal Code runs old, back in 1860 but the provisions which were given were sufficient for us to deal with the issues arising with environment. The most of the part is dealt with nuisance itself. Chapter IV of Indian Penal Code deals with offences relating to public health, safety, decency, convenience, morals under Sections 268, 269, 270, 279, 280, 287, 288, 290, 291, and 294.
