India, Oct. 23 -- The Supreme Court has expanded the scope of identification and demarcation of wetlands to all water bodies across the country, observing that courts cannot be unmindful when precious water bodies, being sources of drinking water, remain unprotected.

A bench of Justices Aravind Kumar and Vipul M Pancholi passed the order this month in petitions seeking preservation of wetlands.

In December 2024, the court directed states and union territories (UTs) to complete ground truthing and physical demarcation of all wetlands identified in the 2021 Space Applications Centre (SAC) Atlas within three months, as per their statutory obligation under the Wetlands (Conservation and Management) Rules, 2017.

The court, through subsequen...