The Supreme Court has suspended the National Green Tribunal (NGT) order against US beverage maker Coca-Cola‘s leading bottler in northern India, Moon Beverages, for causing more than Rs 1.5 lakh crore of environmental damage.

A bench consisting of Judges L Nageswara Rao, BR Gavai and A S Bopanna issued a notice to Ghaziabad residents regarding the Moon Beverages request. NGT passed the order at their request. “On February 25, 2022, the Chief Judge of the National Green Court passed a new judgment and order of the original application No. 69 of 2020, which will be suspended,” the judge said.

Moon Beverages Ltd has challenged the NGT’s order to impose environmental compensation of Rs 1.85 crore on Moon Beverages Ltd, Rs 13.24 crore on Greater Noida Sahibabad Unit and Rs 9.71 crore on Varun Beverages Ltd’s Greater Noida Unit.

The NGT has also formed a joint committee comprising officers from the Ministry of Environment, Ministry of Jal Shakti, CGWA, UPGWD and district magistrates of relevant districts. The Green panel said the committee should develop a recovery plan within two months, implement it within the next six months, and submit a compliance report.

“We have also formed a joint committee of CPCB, CGWA, UPGWD and UPPCB to investigate in UP, and prepare various types of groundwater abstraction data for commercial purposes, study impact assessments, and propose ways and means to reduce groundwater abstraction in OCS areas and how to improve the groundwater level,” it said.

The court is hearing a petition by Ghaziabad resident Sushil Bhatt, which raises the issue of reckless and arbitrary groundwater extraction, even in areas where groundwater is extremely scarce. The petition stated that the units mentioned above had not obtained a “No Objection Certificate” issued by the Central Ground Water Authority for groundwater extraction.

The NGT said the guidelines issued by the Ministry of Jal Shakti to regulate and control groundwater extraction in the country are just new safeguards to the old scheme with minor changes, alterations and modifications to the National Green Court said.

The Green Panel said it was unfortunate that ministries and the Central Groundwater Authority had rushed to issue the 2020 guidance. As a result, most of the deficiencies, breaches and failures identified by the CGWA in the earlier guidance were present.