Overview
- The Environment Ministry convened a December 8 meeting and, in a December 17 office memorandum, instructed the Survey of India to delineate Aravalli areas using the Supreme Court‑accepted 100‑metre local‑relief definition with clusters within 500 metres marked as ranges.
- States have been told to stop granting new mining leases until the Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education completes a Management Plan for Sustainable Mining, with oversight and technical committees formed and agencies asked to share geology and mining data.
- Experts contend the freeze on new leases lacks binding orders and could be a legal façade, while cautioning that a sole height criterion risks inclusion–exclusion errors the ministry itself flagged in filings to the court.
- Opposition leaders cite Forest Survey of India figures to claim nearly 90% of Aravalli hills fall below 100 metres and would lose protection, a claim Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav rejects while asserting a ban across the range.
- Former forest officer R. P. Balwan has sought Supreme Court clarification to apply the mining plan to the entire ecosystem, with a hearing set for January 7, as protests escalate in Jaipur and the Youth Congress readies an ‘Aravalli Satyagraha Yatra’ from January 7–20.