New Delhi: Union environment minister Bhupender Yadav while responding to Congress leader Jairam Ramesh’s letters on the contentious Great Nicobar Island project has said that while the primary field data was collected over a single season, the data had been integrated with historical data sets before approval. “Although primary field data for the project was collected over a single seasonal cycle, the analysis integrated freshly collected data with long-term historical datasets available with the institutions, thereby ensuring that the environmental assessment and environmental management plan were scientifically robust, comprehensive and based on site-specific ecological understanding,” Yadav wrote in a letter to Ramesh on May 27.Yadav also mentioned two National Green Tribunal orders from 2023 and 2026 where the environmental body did not interfere with the clearances granted to the mega project.Last month, Ramesh had written to Yadav calling the environment impact assessment (EIA) done ahead of the Great Nicobar project a “mockery of the EIA process” and an “insult to science”.In his letter on May 10, Ramesh had slammed the limited data collected as part of the EIA process and questioned the quality of the data on the basis of which clearances have been granted for the development project.Environment ministry’s responseYadav defended the limited data collection saying that while certain field components involved rapid assessments and seasonal surveys, the Rs 92,000 crore project had not been approved solely on the basis of these short-duration studies.Yadav alleged that the approval was based on integrated analysis of long-term data sets and marine investigations.“The shoreline change assessment carried out by the National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management using six time-series satellite datasets over a 17-year period concluded that the eastern flank of Galathea Bay, where the proposed port is located, is predominantly stable to moderately accreting due to offshore sheet rock formations and favourable sediment deposition patterns,” Yadav wrote, adding that “accordingly, the requirement of comprehensive three-season studies is not attracted.” He also noted that the NGT had found the one-season baseline monitoring to be in line with the EIA Guidance Manual for Ports and Central Pollution Control Board norms.The environment minister also mentioned that the project had been examined in detail by expert institutions including Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) and the Wildlife Institute of India (WII). “The ecological significance of Great Nicobar Island has been fully acknowledged and has remained central to the appraisal of the project. The project has been examined in detail with respect to biodiversity, corals, leatherback turtles, megapodes, shoreline stability, marine ecology and tribal welfare by expertinstitutions including ZSI, BSI, SACON and WIl, as well as by the Expert Appraisal Committee and the High Powered Committee constituted by the Hon’ble NGT,” Yadav wrote.However, the WII after submitting its report in favour of the project had later admitted that it had no expertise on or experience with leatherback turtles research in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, The Wire has previously reported.Rapid EIA ‘grossly inadequate’The final EIA report submitted in March 2022 was incomplete and contained cherry-picked data from biodiversity surveys, while ignoring existing information about the island’s biodiversity, The Wire had reported in 2022. The primary survey of ecology and biodiversity was conducted over nine days in December 2020, while the survey of leatherback turtles lasted just seven days in February 2021.Ramesh, in his letter too had pointed out that the EIA report was at best a “Rapid EIA”, which former environment minister Prakash Javadekar had himself described in parliament as inadequate for assessing environmental concerns in ecologically sensitive coastal stretches.Quoting directly from the EIA report, he noted that surveys inside the island’s dense forests were feasible “only to a limited extent” because of “thick impenetrable forests”, and that the report itself admitted that “what is uncovered so far is not complete and what is hidden may be even more valuable.”He also referred to reports prepared by the ZSI and WII saying that these studies too were based on rapid assessments conducted over brief periods in early 2021.Calling the studies “grossly inadequate”, Ramesh had written that the reports “are not even rapid EIAs and are based on baseline data collection over a few days and weeks at best.”