Pallikaranai marshland dispute: Tamil Nadu is the only State to declare as many as 20 Ramsar sites, Madras High Court told

Tamil Nadu is the only State in the country to boast of as many as 20 wetlands designated as ‘Ramsar sites’ of international importance in accordance with an intergovernmental environmental treaty signed at Ramsar in Iran in 1971, the State Wetland Authority told the Madras High Court on Wednesday (November 12, 2025).

Appearing before the first Division Bench of Chief Justice Manindra Mohan Shrivastava and Justice G. Arul Murugan, senior counsel P. Wilson, representing the Tamil Nadu State Wetland Authority (TNSWA), said, the State government was very keen on protecting the wetlands and not allow them to vanish.

When the Chief Justice asked why then a public interest litigation petition had been filed in the court alleging construction of high rise residential towers within the Ramsar site around Pallikaranai marshland in Chennai, the senior counsel said, the petitioner’s averments remain to be just allegations as on date.

He said, the ‘ground truthing’ exercise to fix the boundaries of the Ramsar site at Pallikaranai was yet to be concluded fully and that the Supreme Court, in a case related to protection of wetlands across the country, had granted time till December 2 for the TNSWA to submit its ‘ground truthing’ report.

“The truth will come out once the wetland boundaries are identified and once we place it before Your Lordships. Once we are able to fix the boundaries and place the report before the State government as well as this court, Your Lordships will come to know exactly where this property lies,” he said.

Mr. Wilson urged the Division Bench to take up the present PIL petition for hearing after the Supreme Court hears the related matter next on December 2. Accepting his submission, the judges directed the High Court Registry to list the case before them on December 3.

They also extended, till the next date of hearing, an interim order that they had passed on October 31, 2025 in the PIL petition restraining private real estate developer Brigade Enterprises Limited from constructing the high rise towers at its Pallikaranai project.

J. Brezhnev, Chennai suburban district legal wing secretary of All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, had filed the PIL petition alleging that the high rise towers had been proposed right within the 1,247.54 hectare Ramsar site in Pallikaranai.

Accusing the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority of having granted planning permission for the real estate project on January 23, 2025 without taking into account the sensitive nature of the land, the litigant had urged the court to quash the permission.