Supreme Court Sets November 30 Deadline for Aravalli Panel

Key facts

• The Supreme Court rejected a six-month extension sought by its high-powered committee on the Aravallis and directed it to submit its final report by November 30, 2026.
• Chief Justice of India Surya Kant questioned whether the committee was 'waiting for his retirement'; he is due to demit office on February 9, 2027.
• The Bench, also comprising Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V. Mohana, said no further extension would be granted and asked the panel to 'work day and night'.
• The five-member committee is headed by Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education Director General Kanchan Devi.
• The committee must evolve a uniform definition of the ecologically fragile Aravalli hills and range and recommend measures to regulate future mining.
• The court asked the committee to submit interim reports on issues requiring immediate consideration and to hear all stakeholders, including tribal communities in Rajasthan and Gujarat.
• The matter will be heard next on December 2, by which time the final report is expected.
• The Aravalli range forms a natural barrier between the arid desert regions in the northwest and the fertile northern plains.
• The Supreme Court has been regulating mining in the region since 2002.
• A 2018 Forest Survey of India report recorded the disappearance of 31 hillocks across nearly 3,000 sites in Rajasthan and Haryana due to illegal mining.
• In November 2025, the Supreme Court accepted a definition proposed by an eight-member committee headed by the Union Environment Secretary: a landform rising 100 metres or more above local relief qualifies as an Aravalli hill, and two or more such hills within 500 metres constitute the Aravalli range.
• The definition triggered concern that large parts of the Aravalli landscape could fall outside its ambit and be opened to mining.
• On December 29, 2025, the Supreme Court took suo motu cognisance of these concerns, kept its November order in abeyance, and barred new mining leases and renewals.
• In May, the court constituted the high-powered committee for a scientific assessment of the Aravalli landscape and to examine ecological consequences of mining and development.
• In its interim report submitted on August 31, 2026, the committee said the Aravallis could not be adequately defined on the basis of a single terrain or elevation criterion.
• The committee is assessing spatial, ecological, geological, hydrological, and socio-economic factors along with stakeholder inputs.
• The committee comprises Brij Mohan Singh Rathore, Ashok K. Bhatnagar, Subhash Ashutosh, and Rajendra Kumar Sharma, with Professors Jagdish Krishnaswamy and Laxmikant Sharma as special invitees.
• The Aravalli Virasat Jan Abhiyaan (AVJA) criticised the court's refusal to grant the extension, alleging inadequate public consultations and no visits to villages affected by illegal mining.