The Supreme Court On Wednesday expanded the scope of its hearing in the challenge to the Central Vista redevelopment project and will now also examine the validity of the June 17 environmental clearance (EC) given to it. This will be in addition to the issue surrounding the legality of the change in land use which is already under the consideration of the top court through two petitions pending before it.

The court decided this after a former IAS officer and two environmentalists’ solicited intervention in the matter and solicited a recall of the apex court’s June 21 order which said that any petition or proceeding concerning the Central Vista project will have to be heard by the Supreme Court.

Project involves other issues like grant of environmental clearance which can be challenged before the National Green Tribunal (NGT), but that the top court’s earlier order posed a hindrance to take recourse to other legal remedies pointed out by The interveners, former secretary of Ministry of Environment and Forests, Meena Gupta, and environmentalists Pradip Krishen and Ashish Kothari in their intervention application filed through advocate Anshuman Srivastava on July 7

A three-judge bench headed by Justice AM Khanwilkar then asked the interveners to file a fresh petition before the apex court challenging the EC for the project on June 17.

The Central Vista houses iconic buildings like the Parliament House, Rashtrapati Bhavan, the North and South Block buildings, which house important ministries, other buildings around Rajpath, and India Gate. The union government plans to redevelop the Central Vista by constructing a new Parliament house, a new residential complex that will house the Prime Minister and the Vice President besides several new office buildings.

On Wednesday, senior counsel Shyam Divan, appearing for the interveners said, “This is a huge project involving many clearances. Other legal remedies available should not be put in one bucket due to this case” .

However, The court, advised the interveners to withdraw their application and file a fresh petition before the Supreme Court challenging the EC. Divan and advocate Shikhil Suri and senior counsel Sanjay Hegde who were appearing for the two petitioners agreed to the proposal.

The case will be heard again in the third week of August.

The central government has maintained that the redevelopment is in conformity with the existing laws and will not harm any heritage buildings. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, on Wednesday, said the proposed new buildings belong to the nation and public and disapproved the language used by petitioners while making arguments.