The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has suspended the Union Environment Ministry’s clearance for the project granted in 2012. The clearance, the court noted, didn’t consider the impact of the hydro project — promoted by Noida-based textile-to-steel conglomerate, LNJ Bhilwara Group — on the habitat of the black-necked crane, a species that breeds on the Tibetan plateau and migrates to Tawang for the winter. The bird, most commonly found in China, is legally protected in Bhutan and India and is considered sacred to certain Buddhist traditions.

The black-necked crane is rated as ‘vulnerable’ in the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) list of endangered species and is listed in India’s Wildlife Act as a Schedule 1 species, which gives animals and birds the highest legal protection.

Other species that are found in the region include the red panda, the snow leopard and the Arunachal macaque Macacamunzala, a recently-described primate species in the area, according to court documents viewed by The Hindu . The project is planned on the NyamjangChhuriver and is the largest of 13 hydro power projects to be built in the Tawang basin. With the NGT’s order, project developers will need to revisit their environmental clearance process.

“The EC (environmental clearance) is suspended till the time the studies as directed are carried out… The EAC (Expert Appraisal Committee) shall thereupon, make fresh appraisal of the proposal for grant of EC and take appropriate decision for making recommendations to the Ministry of Environment and Forests and Climate Change, who shall take decision thereupon in accordance with law,” says the order signed by Justice UD Salvi and Prof. AR Yousuf on April 7. “This is probably the first time that the threat to wildlife played a key role in the court’s decision to suspend environmental clearance,” said Ritwick Dutta, lawyer for the Save Mon Region Federation, a social-religious group in Arunachal Pradesh, which petitioned the NGT to revoke the Environment Ministry’s go-ahead for the project.

However a spokesperson for the Bhilwara group said they were unaware of the presence of the black crane when they applied for clearance. “We’ve been asked to undertake a more comprehensive study to estimate its impact and we will factor that in…we won’t challenge this order and will comply with the directions,” said O.P. Ajmera, head of Bhilwara’s hydropower division.

Praveen Bhargav, Managing Trustee, Wildlife First, said the protection of species was a central plank on the basis of which project clearances were historically revoked by courts.