KATHMANDU — In a historic move, Nepal’s highest court has struck down controversial measures to open up protected areas like national parks to infrastructure development such as hydropower plants, hotels and railway lines. The constitutional bench of the Supreme Court, headed by Chief Justice Prakash Man Singh Raut, issued the verdict on Jan. 15 in a case dubbed as one of the most important in Nepal’s conservation history. “The court has issued an historic order scrapping measures that allow the development of infrastructure inside national parks,” senior lawyer Padam Bahadur Shrestha, one of the petitioners in the case, told Mongabay. The court issued a brief statement following the order, the full text of which is to be issued later. While four of the judges stood in favour of a verdict sought by the petitioners, a lone judge voiced his opinion against such as move. “The concurrent opinion issued by judge Sapana Pradhan Malla is a highlight of the ruling,” said Shrestha. Malla, while agreeing with three other judges in favour of scrapping of the new law, stated that protected areas are to be safeguarded for future generations based on the principles of inter-generational equity. She added that it would be wrong to pit development and environment against each other by adhering to the belief that development can take place only when there’s damage to the environment. Lawyers Shrestha, Dilraj Khanal, Prakash Mani Sharma and Sanjay Adhikari filed the petition with Nepal’s highest court on July 28, days after lawmakers passed…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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