User friendly environmental clearance policy soon: Ajay Shankar

Mumbai, Sep 22 (UNI) The Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) of the Union Ministry of Commerce and Industry has taken up with the Ministry of Environment to frame user friendly environment procedure to enable speedy clearances of industrial projects, a senior government official said today.

At the same time there will not be any compromise on the strict environmental requirements for any project, DIPP secretary Ajay Shankar said at the seventh manufacturing summit of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) here.

Mr Shankar said with green being the mantra globally, the industries here should come out with environment-friendly products by adopting green technology and production practices.

He said his department was in dialogue with the Environment Ministry to ensure that the clearances required are made user friendly. He was responding to queries from the delegates about the enormous time taken by the environment department to clear projects.

At the same time, he said, it was the duty of the industry to ensure that they comply with the rules and also take up a cluster type approach to set up effluent treatment plants. In this regard, he cited the expample of the leather industry, saying it had woken up to the reality and was resorting to innovative means to treat their effluents.

He added that a unique model of service agencies setting up plants to the norms set by the industry has come up in Tamil Nadu.

UNI VK ZA/SSS SY DS1357