Role of Indian government to protect the environment sustainability - An overview

Sustainability is based on a simple principle: Everything that we need for our survival and well-being depends, either directly or indirectly, on our natural environment. Sustainability creates and maintains the conditions under which humans and nature can exist in productive harmony, that permit fulfilling the social, economic and other requirements of present and future generations. Sustainability is important to making sure that we have and will continue to have, the water, materials, and resources to protect human health and our environment. Our actions impact the environment. Today we realize that each thing we do can help or hurt our planet in many ways. We all need to take ownership of environmental protection. Even though, the rapid growing population and economic development is leading to a number of environmental issues in India because of the uncontrolled growth of urbanization and industrialization, expansion and massive intensification of agriculture, and the destruction of forests. The uprising population and the environmental deterioration face the challenge of sustainable development. Population growth and economic development are contributing too many serious environmental calamities in India. These include heavy pressure on land, land degradation, forests, habitat destruction and loss of biodiversity. Changing consumption pattern has led to rising demand for energy. The final outcomes of this are air pollution, global warming, climate change, water scarcity and water pollution. In the Constitution of India it is clearly stated that it is the duty of the state to ‘protect and improve the environment and to safeguard the forests and wildlife of the country’. It imposes a duty on every citizen ‘to protect and improve the natural environment including forests, lakes, rivers, and wildlife’. The Environment Protection Act authorizes the central government to protect and improve environmental quality, control and reduce pollution from all sources, and prohibit or restrict the setting and/or operation of any industrial facility on environmental grounds. In this view, the present paper focuses on the Role of Indian Government to Protect the Environment Sustainability over the period of time.