Neutral Citation No. - 2025:AHC:34871-DB Court No. - 40 Case :- WRIT - C No. - 6640 of 2025 Petitioner :- M/S Anjali Construction Enterprises Respondent :- State Of U.P. And 5 Others Counsel for Petitioner :- Mukesh Kumar Singh,Vinayak Mithal Counsel for Respondent :- C.S.C.,Parth Goswami Hon'ble Shekhar B. Saraf,J. Hon'ble Vipin Chandra Dixit,J. 1. Heard Sri Vinayak Mithal, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner, learned Standing Counsel appearing on behalf of the State respondents and Sri Parth Goswami, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the respondent No.5. 2. This is a writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India wherein the writ petitioner is aggrieved by the order dated January 30, 2025 passed by the respondent No.4./National Green Tribunal, Principal Bench, New Delhi in Original Application No.48 of 2025. The main challenge to the impugned order is that the said order was passed without granting an opportunity of hearing to the petitioner. 3. Counsel appearing for the petitioner submits that as the petitioner was not present before the National Green Tribunal (hereinafter referred to as the "Tribunal"), he could not produce notification dated January 18, 2021 that had extended the period of Environmental Clearance. He has relied on the said notification annexed at page 61 of the writ petition to indicate the amendment that had been carried out by way of said notification. The relevant part of the said notification is provided below: "In the said notification, - (1) in paragraph 7, in sub-paragraph 7(i), under sub-heading II. "Stage (2)- Scoping", after clause (viii), the following clause shall be inserted, namely:- "(ix). Notwithstanding anything contained above, the period from the 1" April, 2020 to the 31 March, 2021 shall not be considered for the purpose of calculation of the period of validity of Terms of Reference granted. under the provisions of this notification in view of outbreak of Corona Virus (COVID- 19) and subsequent lockdowns (total or partial) declared for its control, however, all activities undertaken during this period in respect of the said Terms of Reference shall be treated as valid": (ii) for paragraph 9A, the following paragraph shall be substituted namely:- "9.4. Notwithstanding anything contained in this notification, the period from the 1" April, 2020 to the 31 March, 2021 shall not be considered for the purpose of calculation of the period of validity of Prior Environmental Clearances granted under the provisions of this notification in view of outbreak of Corona Virus (COVID-19) and subsequent lockdowns (total or partial) declared for its control, however, all activities undertaken during this period in respect of the Environmental Clearance granted shall be treated as valid."." 4. According to the counsel appearing for the petitioner, the notification extended the period of Environmental Clearance by a period of one year, as the period from 1st April 2020 to 31st March 2021 was not to be taken into account for the purpose of calculation of the period of validity of the Environmental Clearance. He submits that this particular fact was suppressed by the applicant before the Tribunal being respondent No.5 herein. He further submits that because of the same, the Tribunal passed the order directing stopping of the alleged illegal mining by the petitioner. The Tribunal has constituted a Joint Committee that is to ascertain the extent of illegal mining and the correctness of allegation made by the respondent No.5. 5. Counsel appearing for the respondent No.5 has raised preliminary objection with regard to the maintainability of the writ petition and has relied on the judgment of coordinate Bench of this Court passed in M/s Hotel The Grand Tulsi and Others v. State of U.P. and Others (Writ-C No.29179 of 2023, Netural Citation No.- 2023:AHC:160024-DB) to submit that only in exceptional cases, the High Court would intervene. He relies on paragraph Nos. 10 to 13 of the said judgment to buttress his arguments. He further submits that this is not a case where the original Environmental Clearance and the lease for mining was granted to the petitioner but is a case of transfer of Environmental Clearance in favour of the petitioner by an order dated July 11, 2024 where the State Level Environment Impact Assessment Authority working under the aegis of the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change has transferred the Environmental Clearance, earlier granted to M/s RSI, Stone World Pvt. Limited, Bhopal, with nine further conditions as listed in the transfer agreement. He, accordingly, submits that this transfer agreement would not be impacted by the notification that is being relied on by the counsel appearing for the petitioner, as the Environmental Clearance was never granted to the petitioner and the benefit of Covid could not have been given to the petitioner when it did not have the Environmental Clearance during the relevant period. 6. We have considered the arguments advanced by the counsel appearing on behalf of the parties and also perused the material on record. 7. In the present case, we are of the view that the Tribunal has acted on material available before it and acted in the interest of the nation by stopping the alleged illegal mining. The petitioner has been granted liberty to appear before the Joint Committee and make its stand clear before the said committee. 8. However, since the order impugned herein is ex parte in nature, we are of the opinion that permission should be granted to the petitioner to file an urgent application seeking vacation of the order of the Tribunal. Accordingly, we direct the petitioner to file an urgent stay vacation application before the Tribunal, and in the event such an application is filed within next seven days, we request the Tribunal to expeditiously hear the same in accordance with law. 9. With the aforesaid direction, the writ petition is disposed of. Order Date :- 10.3.2025 Kuldeep (Vipin Chandra Dixit, J.) (Shekhar B. Saraf, J.) Digitally signed by :- KULDEEP SINGH High Court of Judicature at Allahabad