Guwahati, July 29 -- The Supreme Court on Wednesday quashed the Centre's 2021 Office Memorandum (OM) on ex post facto environmental clearances for infrastructure projects, holding that administrative orders cannot be used to fundamentally modify the environmental protection framework.

The Bench observed that the OM, being an executive order, sought to establish a permanent arrangement for approving projects that had started work without securing prior environmental clearance.

It held that the measure changed the process of assessment and the conditions for granting approval under the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Notification, 2006. According to the court, an administrative order cannot override or replace delegated legislation....