A central empowered committee of the Supreme Court on Wednesday recommended a penalty of Rs 150 crore on the University of Science and Technology in Meghalaya’s Ri-Bhoi district for allegedly encroaching forest land, The Indian Express reported.

In a report on inter-state impacts, the committee alleged that the university was built on 25 hectares of encroached forest land. It recommended that the entire area occupied by the institution and surrounding buildings be “fully restored” to forest within a year.

The committee added that the penalty should be used to remove all “illegal structures”.

The private university, operated by the Education and Research Development foundation owned by Mahbubul Hoque, has been at the receiving end of communal jibes from Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma.

Hoque is a Bengali-origin Muslim from Assam’s Karimganj district.

Sarma has claimed that the university was responsible for the flash floods in Guwahati on August 5, 2024.

The Bharatiya Janata Party leader alleged that the campus was built by cutting trees and destroying hills in the adjacent Ri Bhoi district, which triggered floods in Guwahati. He accused the university of waging a “flood jihad”.

The hills of Meghalaya in the Ri Bhoi district slope into Guwahati. The campus is about 6 km from the outskirts of Guwahati.

The central empowered committee report submitted on Wednesday was based on a case filed in the court seeking directions to address alleged rampant environmental degradation in the Ri-Bhoi and East Khasi Hills districts in Meghalaya, and its transboundary impact on Assam, particularly in Guwahati city.

The technical committee advises the court on forest and environment protection, along with matters on legal compliance, according to The Indian Express.

Basing its conclusions on an analysis of the definition of a forest and laws followed in Meghalaya, the committee found that “out of 15.71 hectares of existing USTM constructed area, 13.62 is forest land”.

It added that 7.64 hectares, out of 12.13 hectares of forest land earmarked for PA Sangma Memorial Medical College in Ri-Bhoi district, had already been broken up or used, according to the newspaper.

The private medical college is affiliated with University of Science and Technology.

“The breaking of land has been done devastatingly, and the surroundings have been heavily disturbed,” the newspaper quoted the report as stating. “Massive” and “indiscriminate” destruction of the site is evident, it added.

According to the newspaper, the committee calculated the Rs 150.35 crore cumulative penalty using seven different heads – penal net present value to be paid for forest land, tree cutting, environmental compensation, land restoration, cost for demolition and compensatory afforestation.

The committee said that it had examined the land status of the university. It found that in 2017, the Union Environment Ministry’s regional office had asked the Meghalaya government to carry out a ground verification.

The regional office determined that 13.62 hectares of the university’s land under scrutiny was forest area and directed it and the foundation to submit a proposal for forest diversion under the Forest Conservation Act.

The central empowered committee report said that no clearance was obtained.

In addition, a second land parcel measuring over 12.13 hectares was to be used to set up the medical college, the report added. However, the state forest department in 2021 said that this plot is forest land and found that Meghalaya Forest Regulation was violated.

The university’s application to seek forest clearance for this plot was under examination, it added.

The report added that illegal mining was found in Ri-Bhoi and recommended that all such activities in the district be suspended till an official review is conducted.

In August 2024, Sarma claimed that he was looking into the possibility of restricting students who graduate from the University of Science and Technology. He claimed that the students who graduated from the university received a certificate from another state.

Hoque was also booked by the Assam Police after students at a school run by his foundation alleged malpractice during the physics examination.

Also read: How communal rumours hid the truth about the deluge in Assam’s Silchar

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