UPSC Darpan

Environment & EcologyGS321 September 2026

Justice Nagarathna Says Supreme Court Is Shifting From Anthropocentric to Ecocentric Environmental Law

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The news

NEW DELHI. Supreme Court judge Justice B.V. Nagarathna said on Sunday, 20 September, that the apex court is now pushing for a shift from an anthropocentric to an ecocentric approach in matters of the environment, The Indian Express reported from a Press Trust of India dispatch. She was addressing the valedictory session of an international conference on “The Future of Environment and Climate Dynamics” organised by the National Green Tribunal, at which President Droupadi Murmu was the chief guest. An anthropocentric approach regards human beings as the central or most vital element in the universe, while an ecocentric approach places the natural environment and ecosystems at the centre of moral consideration rather than just human beings. Describing the Supreme Court's contribution to environmental jurisprudence as “overwhelming and significant”, Justice Nagarathna said, “Environmental adjudication is an exercise in foresight, requiring courts to govern the present with an alert consciousness of the future.” Environmental law, she said, must move away from treating nature as property, commodity or resource. This entails recognising that human interests do not, by virtue of being human, enjoy automatic precedence over the interests of the non-human world; rather, humans bear obligations towards non-human life that exist independently of their utility to them. “In recent years, courts across many jurisdictions, including the SC, have emerged as central actors in giving concrete meaning to the idea of environmental justice. This aligns environmental protection with substantive equality, insisting that environmental governance must account not only for aggregated outcomes but for their differentiated social impacts,” she said. NGT Chairperson Justice Prakash Shrivastava said environmental protection must go beyond identifying challenges and focus on building laws, institutions and partnerships capable of responding to emerging threats: “Those with fewer resources often face the greatest risk. Climate action must therefore be inclusive, equitable, and attentive to vulnerable communities and future generations.” Solicitor General Tushar Mehta said environmental challenges can no longer be addressed by a single institution or discipline and require the combined efforts of law, governance, science, economics and society. Union Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs and Power Manohar Lal also spoke. The Indian Express separately noted that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, delivering the keynote at the same conference on Saturday, rattled off figures on solar capacity and emissions and told the lawyers present that the numbers may come in handy someday. Syllabus link: environmental jurisprudence, Article 21 and the role of the judiciary, GS2 and GS3.

The chain in one line: Article 21 read to include a healthy environment → courts import precautionary and polluter-pays principles → NGT created in 2010 as a specialised forum → climate change recognised as a rights issue → Supreme Court judge articulates an ecocentric turn at an NGT conference

Static syllabus linkage

  1. The constitutional anchor is a reading of Article 21, not a stated right. The Constitution has no express fundamental right to environment. The Supreme Court read it into the right to life under Article 21, notably in Subhash Kumar v. State of Bihar (1991), holding that life includes the enjoyment of pollution-free water and air. Article 48A, a Directive Principle, and Article 51A(g), a Fundamental Duty, were both inserted by the Constitution (Forty-second Amendment) Act, 1976 and oblige the State and the citizen respectively to protect the environment.
  2. Three judge-made principles carry most of Indian environmental law. In Vellore Citizens Welfare Forum v. Union of India (1996) the Court declared the precautionary principle and the polluter pays principle to be part of the law of the land as elements of sustainable development. In M.C. Mehta v. Kamal Nath (1997) it adopted the public trust doctrine, under which the State holds natural resources such as rivers, forests and seashores in trust for the public and cannot hand them over for private use. These three principles are the working tools behind any ecocentric claim.
  3. The ecocentric turn already has a line of judgments. In Centre for Environmental Law, WWF-India v. Union of India (2013), the Asiatic lion translocation case, the Court said that environmental justice could be achieved only by moving from an anthropocentric to an ecocentric approach and that the survival of a species has intrinsic value. In M.K. Ranjitsinh v. Union of India (2024), the Great Indian Bustard case, the Court recognised a right against the adverse effects of climate change flowing from Articles 14 and 21. Justice Nagarathna's remarks sit on this line rather than inventing it.
  4. The NGT is a statutory tribunal with a defined mandate. The National Green Tribunal was established under the National Green Tribunal Act, 2010, for effective and expeditious disposal of cases relating to environmental protection, conservation of forests and other natural resources. Section 20 of the Act directs it to apply the principles of sustainable development, the precautionary principle and the polluter pays principle. It is chaired by a retired Supreme Court judge or High Court Chief Justice, and appeals from it lie directly to the Supreme Court.

Why UPSC loves this

  1. Environmental jurisprudence is set under both GS2 and GS3. UPSC has asked about the role of the judiciary in environmental governance, the powers of the NGT and the tension between judicial activism and executive policy. A speech by a sitting judge is not itself a ruling, but it signals the direction of reasoning, and the examiner rewards candidates who can name the cases the reasoning rests on.
  2. Ethics papers use ecocentrism directly. GS4 has asked about environmental ethics and the moral standing of non-human life. The anthropocentric-ecocentric distinction defined in this report is exactly the vocabulary those questions expect, and it pairs well with deep ecology and with Indian traditions of reverence for nature.
  3. Rights of nature is a recurring essay theme. The Uttarakhand High Court's 2017 declaration of the Ganga and Yamuna as living entities, later stayed by the Supreme Court, and similar moves abroad make the legal personhood of nature a live essay and interview topic.

Prelims nuggets

  • Article 48A (Directive Principle) and Article 51A(g) (Fundamental Duty) on protection of the environment were inserted by the Constitution (Forty-second Amendment) Act, 1976.
  • The Supreme Court read the right to a pollution-free environment into Article 21 in Subhash Kumar v. State of Bihar (1991).
  • The precautionary principle and the polluter pays principle were held to be part of Indian law in Vellore Citizens Welfare Forum v. Union of India (1996).
  • The public trust doctrine was adopted by the Supreme Court in M.C. Mehta v. Kamal Nath (1997).
  • The National Green Tribunal was established under the National Green Tribunal Act, 2010; Section 20 requires it to apply sustainable development, precautionary and polluter pays principles.
  • Appeals against orders of the National Green Tribunal lie to the Supreme Court.
  • An anthropocentric approach treats human beings as the central element of moral concern; an ecocentric approach places ecosystems and the natural environment at the centre.

Analysis

  1. An ecocentric principle is easy to state and hard to apply in a poor country. If humans do not enjoy automatic precedence over the non-human world, then a court weighing a dam, a mine or a highway must give weight to species and habitats that cannot speak. That is coherent philosophy. The practical difficulty is that the people displaced or left without work by such a weighing are usually the poorest, who also cannot easily reach the court. Justice Nagarathna's own linkage of environmental justice to substantive equality is the necessary corrective: an ecocentric law that ignores differentiated social impacts would simply relocate the costs of conservation onto the vulnerable.
  2. The courts have been ahead of the legislature, and that is both a strength and a risk. Nearly every core principle of Indian environmental law came from judgments rather than statutes. That filled a real vacuum, but it also means the rules shift with benches and are enforced through continuing mandamus rather than institutions. The counter-view is that without judicial push there would be no Taj Trapezium, no CNG in Delhi's buses and no forest conservation regime worth the name. The better conclusion is that judicial doctrine now needs legislative codification, so that an ecocentric standard does not depend on which judge hears the case.
  3. Foresight is the most useful phrase in the speech. Describing adjudication as governing the present with consciousness of the future implies inter-generational equity, which is harder for courts than it sounds: future generations are not parties, and the harm is probabilistic. The Great Indian Bustard case showed the tension, as the Court first ordered undergrounding of power lines across a large area and then modified the order when the cost to renewable energy targets became clear. Foresight in practice means weighing one future good against another, not only the future against the present.
  4. The government and the judiciary spoke in different registers at the same event. The Prime Minister's keynote emphasised solar capacity and avoided emissions; the judge spoke of the moral standing of nature. These are not contradictory, but they reflect two theories of environmental policy — one of growth made cleaner, the other of limits. Much of India's future environmental litigation, from solar parks on grasslands to hydropower in the Himalaya, will sit exactly where these two theories collide.

Possible Mains question

“The Supreme Court is pushing for a shift from an anthropocentric to an ecocentric approach in environmental matters.” Discuss the evolution of environmental jurisprudence in India and examine whether an ecocentric approach can be reconciled with the development needs of the poor.

Model approach

  1. Introduction. Define the two approaches exactly as the report does and attribute the statement to Justice B.V. Nagarathna at the NGT's international conference, noting that it is a signal of judicial reasoning rather than a ruling.
  2. Body — the evolution. Trace Article 21 (Subhash Kumar, 1991), the precautionary and polluter pays principles (Vellore, 1996), the public trust doctrine (Kamal Nath, 1997), the NGT Act 2010 and Section 20, the ecocentric statement in the lion translocation case (2013) and the climate-rights recognition in M.K. Ranjitsinh (2024).
  3. Body — the tension with development. Explain how conservation costs fall disproportionately on forest dwellers, fishers and farmers, use the judge's own point on substantive equality and differentiated impacts, and give an example of a court modifying an order when costs to other public goods became clear.
  4. Body — reconciliation. Codification of judicial principles in statute, compensation and benefit-sharing with affected communities, Forest Rights Act recognition as an ally of conservation, and strengthening regulators so that courts are not the first responders.
  5. Conclusion. Argue that ecocentrism and equity are compatible only if the price of protecting nature is paid by the society that benefits, not by the communities living closest to it.

Administrator's brainstorm

As Member Secretary of a State Pollution Control Board, you receive an NGT order that relies on ecocentric reasoning to shut a cluster of small units that employ several thousand workers. What do you do?

Comply with the order without delay, because a tribunal's direction is binding and partial compliance invites contempt. At the same time, prepare a factual compliance plan that shows which units can meet standards with specific investments and in what time, and place it before the tribunal with a request for phased reopening of compliant units. Coordinate with the labour department on the workers' dues and interim support. The purpose is to obey the order while giving the tribunal the information it needs to calibrate it.

An interview board asks you whether a river or a forest should have legal rights of its own. What is your view?

Legal personhood for nature is a useful idea because it gives standing to interests that otherwise have no one to represent them. But personhood without a clear guardian, a budget and an enforcement mechanism risks being symbolic, as the stay on the Uttarakhand High Court's Ganga and Yamuna order showed. I would prefer strengthening existing tools — the public trust doctrine, environmental impact assessment and the NGT — while experimenting with guardianship for specific ecosystems where a responsible body can be named.

As a District Magistrate, you must decide on a quarry lease near a wildlife corridor that has no formal protected status. The applicant meets every legal requirement. How do you apply the principle discussed by the judge?

Legality is the minimum, not the whole decision. I would seek the forest department's written assessment of the corridor and the cumulative impact of existing quarries, and invoke the precautionary principle recognised by the Supreme Court if the evidence of harm is credible. If I decide to refuse or impose conditions, I would record reasons in a speaking order so that it can withstand appeal. A decision grounded in documented ecological evidence is defensible; one grounded in personal preference is not.