Bengaluru: On Sunday, November 30, a small group of 30-odd citizens including children gathered at the Chakkarpur-Wazirabad eco-restoration corridor in Gurgaon, Delhi, under the Aravalli Bachao citizens collective.

“Do you want to breathe? Do you want to drink water? Then save the Aravallis,” one of the many posters they held up read. 

On December 3, Congress leader and chair of the Congress Parliamentary Party Sonia Gandhi cited the example of the Aravallis, detailing why India needed “a new deal for the environment”. “The Modi Government has now nearly signed a death warrant for these hills, already denuded by illegal mining,” she wrote in The Hindu.

On December 5, an online petition initiated by the citizen collectives People For Aravallis and Save Sariska said that the Supreme Court had immersed the ancient hill range into an “existential crisis” after its judgment on November 20. Among the five main demands that the online petition asks citizens to make is that India’s apex court recall its recent judgment – one, that they say, will endanger the Aravallis greatly. The petition, signed by citizen signatories, will be sent to around 30 officials and authorities including the Supreme Court of India.

What is this judgment, how is it endangering the Aravallis now, why are citizens galvanising into action for the hill range, and how bad is this ‘death warrant’ that Gandhi spoke about?

The Wire breaks it down for you.

What are the Aravallis?

The Aravallis are a long stretch of low-and mid-elevation hills (ranging from ) in northwest India. 

The hill range contains a diverse variety of habitats. These include dry deciduous forests, such as those found in the Sariska Tiger Reserve which is home to India’s national animal; tropical thorn forests such as those that dominate in the Delhi Ridge right next door to the national capital; and wetlands like the Sambhar Lake near Jaipur, Rajasthan (formed due to a natural depression in the Aravalli hill range), which supports tens of thousands of local and migratory birds.

The Aravallis are also one of the oldest fold-mountain systems of the world: according to some estimates such as this one, it was formed in the Pre-Cambrian era which dates back to about 3-4 billion years ago. This makes it much older than the adjacent Himalayas (though home to the world’s tallest peak, this mountain range is only about 40-50 million years old). 

The hill range provides a host of ecosystem services across its 700-km length. These include regulatory services which play a key role in maintaining climate, carbon sequestration, air and water quality, preventing soil erosion and more.

The Aravallis are also home to many sacred groves, or lands protected by local communities for their spiritual and cultural significance. In 2023, for instance, scientists identified a staggering 89 such small and big sacred sites in Udaipur district in the Rajasthan Aravallis alone.

“The Aravalli range, which runs from Gujarat through Rajasthan and till Haryana, has long played a significant role in Indian geography and history,” Gandhi wrote in an article for The Hindu on December 5. “It has served as a barrier to the spread of desertification from the Thar Desert to the Gangetic Plains, guarded Rajasthan's proudest forts such as Chittorgarh and Ranthambore, and served as the cradle of spirituality for communities across northwest India.”

Clearly, the Aravallis are important for not just wildlife and biodiversity, but people too.

A hill range already under threat

The Aravallis face a number of threats. Illegal mining is a prime concern. A book chapter in 2021 identified “illegal and rampant mining”, as well as unorganised urbanisation, over-exploitation of natural resources, introduction and spread of invasive species, disposal of untreated sewage and solid waste and deforestation as major threats.

The Delhi government itself identifies illegal mining, along with the construction of buildings, roads and housing, conversion of forest land into parks (such as this plan by the Haryana government), garbage dumping, and the introduction of invasive species (such as Prosopis juliflora or the vilayati babool tree) as some of the chief threats that the Delhi Ridge (which is part of the Aravallis in the union territory) experiences today.

One of the reasons why mining is such a huge threat across most of the hill range is that there has always been ambiguity in the definition of what constitutes a forest – and is therefore liable to be protected under Indian law – in many parts of the Aravallis. In Haryana for instance, the Aravallis are called gair mumkin pahar (or ‘uncultivable hilly areas’). 

However, conservationists have been fighting long battles to ensure that these open forests, hillocks and grasslands are still protected, and illegal mining operations shut down. For instance, in July this year, the district of Nuh in Haryana got a dedicated ‘mining unit’ to prevent illegal mining; the local administration also closed down four roads allegedly constructed by illegal miners in the district and wrongly regularised, The Tribune reported.

Why are citizens demanding its protection now?

On November 20, the Supreme Court accepted a new definition of the Aravalli hill ranges that the Union Environment Ministry proposed: that only hills above 100 meters above the local terrain be considered as the ‘Aravalli Hills and Ranges’.

“Those hills and ranges comprising rocks of the Aravalli Supergroup and Delhi Supergroup, which originated during the Palacoproerozoid to Mesoproterozoic, having a relief higher than 100 meters ( 5 Meters) above the surrounding terrain, may be defined as 'Aravalli Hills and Ranges’,” the court order read.

The new definition treats a landform as part of the Aravalli landscape only if it has at least 100 metres of elevation above the local relief (including the landform’s slopes and adjacent areas), the Jhatkaa signature petition that went online on December 5 noted. This is highly unusual: the elevations of physical and geographical features are usually expressed in metres above mean sea level – and are not dependent on the terrain around them. However, the report of the committee that looked into this that was accessed by The Wire justified this by noting that the use of elevation alone as a “sole criterion cannot suffice the purpose as taking the average elevation for defining Aravalli Hills and Ranges will lead to inclusion and exclusion error for selection of Aravalli Hills and Ranges in the four States”.

But here’s the problem: by this new definition, at least 90% of the Aravallis will no longer be protected legally. 

According to a report by the Indian Express, internal documents of the Forest Survey of India (FSI) showed that only 1,048 of 12,081 Aravalli Hills 20 metres or higher and spread across 15 districts in Rajasthan, are 100 metres or more in height. This means that just about 8.7% of the Aravallis in Rajasthan will be protected by this definition. Rajasthan has the highest area under the Aravallis across all states. The news report also quoted an official of the Union Environment ministry as saying that the FSI had cautioned that the 100 metre cut-off “would protect only a few guard posts while surrendering the fences below”. Losing lower hills will likely expose vast areas to sand and dust particles blowing from the Thar desert to the Indo-Gangetic plains and endanger the livelihood of farmers and health of people, including those living in Delhi-NCR, the Indian Express quoted the unnamed official as saying.

“The acceptance of the uniform definition of the Aravalli hills by the SC bench is extremely regressive,” Neelam Ahluwalia, Founder Member, People for Aravallis, told The Wire.

“How can a 3 billion-year-old ecosystem which is India’s ecological, geological and cultural heritage be so narrowly defined to facilitate mining and commercial exploitation? India’s oldest mountain range is bleeding as a result of licensed and illegal mining and real estate development with hill after hill across Haryana, Rajasthan and Gujarat being razed to the ground. Aravallis require strict protection, not illogical and senseless definitions to exclude the majority of the areas from legal protection,” she said.

National security cited again

The new definition of the Aravallis has been adopted to enable mining in the area for reasons including “national security”, documents show.

After an order by the Supreme Court in May 2024, the Union Environment Ministry had constituted a Committee to develop a uniform definition of the Aravalli hills and ranges. While the Committee, after several meetings, agreed that “the presence of vegetation over the Aravalli slopes acts as a value-added protective layer”, arrests soil erosion, regulates local microclimate, and preserves biodiversity. The Committee also added that the hill range contains “precious and strategic minerals” such as gold, tungsten and lead. This offers “substantial potential for future exploration”, an additional affidavit on behalf of the Union Environment Ministry said. 

The hills also contain “significant potential” for critical minerals such as graphite, lithium and other rare earth elements – “all of which are of growing strategic relevance for energy transition, high-technology manufacturing, and national security”. 

“In this context, the Committee was of the considered opinion that while the ecological and environmental integrity of the Aravalli Hills and Ranges must remain the foremost priority, it is equally necessary to evolve framework that enables systematic, scientific, and environmentally sustainable exploitation of critical, strategic, and atomic minerals located within the region. Such a balanced approach would ensure that the country's strategic and developmental interests are not compromised, while upholding the objectives of conservation and ecological restoration.”

This is yet another instance wherein the Union Environment Ministry has cited national security and strategic interests to accelerate developmental activities. The ministry has used this very argument in the case of the slew of infrastructure projects planned in the Great Nicobar island in the Andaman and Nicobar island complex against which several sections of society including ecologists and activists have raised numerous concerns about.

A death knell for the Aravallis

The new re-definition of the Aravallis is disastrous for the hill range chiefly because of the impacts on people, biodiversity and the ecosystem due to the opening of vast tracts of the Aravallis to mining, environmentalists have said. 

Even with existing levels of mining which is already “extensive”, all that local villagers are left with are just “bare hills, dust, rubble and diseases,” said activist Kailash Mina who has been leading grassroot struggles against illegal mining in the Aravallis.

“The uniform definition of the Aravalli hills accepted by the Supreme Court will lead to more destruction in the range and more negative impact on the communities dependent on the Aravallis for their sustenance. Agricultural productivity which has declined across the Aravalli belt in South Haryana and Rajasthan as a result of unavailability of water due to excessive mining and with a layer of dust from the stone crushers covering the crops will be more negatively impacted with more than 90% of the hills across the range not qualifying as Aravalli hills and being opened up for mining,” he added.

The mining that ensues will also have ramifications for human health – not just for local communities living in the vicinity and within the hill range, but even for people living in urban areas including the national capital of New Delhi. Mining in the Aravallis will release more dust and pollution into the air, and this will worsen the already poor air quality in the national capital because Delhi sits right on the edge of the hill range.

Medical practitioners have already noted how the current air quality in Delhi is disastrous for health, even affecting children negatively. 

“How can we destroy more than 90% of [the Aravallis], with just one stroke? As a doctor I see more and more patients who are suffering the consequences of living in high levels of pollution,” Dr. Sharda Yadav, a medical doctor and resident of Gurgaon who participated in the Aravalli Bachao protest on November 30, said. 

Yadav, who specialises in dental surgery, told The Wire that she now sees higher incidences of patients coming in with respiratory issues such as asthma and bronchitis as part of their broader, medical systemic history. 

“Allergic elements present in polluted air cause coughing, sneezing and suffocation leading to mouth breathing. Chronic mouth breathing can lead to a variety of dental problems, including bad breath, gum disease and tooth decay primarily because it causes a dry mouth and affects oral hygiene,” Yadav said.

Ecological and environmental impacts 

The Aravallis are already witnessing degradation due to mining, encroachment and urbanisation. 

“Losing more hills and forests to mining will shrink habitat of wildlife and increase man-animal conflict; intensify desertification; worsen dust pollution, water scarcity and extreme weather events; negatively impact food and water security for millions of people living in North West India,” Ahluwalia told The Wire.

Trees and their canopy cover in the Aravalli hills preserve humidity in the atmosphere, moderates the wind velocity and helps regulate rainfall patterns, ecologist Pia Sethi said in a statement.

“The loss of vegetation cover with the opening up of smaller Aravalli hills for mining as they are not considered as Aravallis anymore can impact local rainfall patterns and temperature, leading to increased heat stress throughout the Aravalli belt in North West India,” she commented. 

Groundwater recharge will also be affected, said water conservationist Rajendra Singh, famously called “The Waterman of India”. The Magsaysay award winner stressed that many districts in the Aravallis are already highly water-stressed.

“The Aravalli region acts as a critical water recharge zone,” he said. “The highly fractured and weathered rocks with their natural cracks allow water to percolate and recharge the groundwater. Calculations reveal an immense potential of 2 million litres of ground water recharge per hectare of the Aravalli landscape. Aquifers lying beneath the Aravallis are interconnected and any disturbance or alterations in the pattern due to breaking of hills due to mining can significantly alter the groundwater table and its purity.”

'Scrap definition, recall judgment'

The letter put together by the People For Aravallis and Save Sariska which is to be sent to 30 officials and government authorities including the Supreme Court demands that the government scrap the new, uniform definition of the Aravallis.

It also demands that the Supreme Court order dated November 20 that accepts this new definition of the Aravallis be recalled, “as the decision risks irreversible damage to North West India’s only barrier against desertification, critical water recharge zones, pollution sinks, wildlife habitats and public health”.

It urges the government to declare the Aravallis across Gujarat, Rajasthan, Haryana and Delhi as a ‘Critical Ecological Zone’ because of the suite of crucial ecosystem services that the range provides for millions of people living in northwest India.

Another demand is that all mining and stone crushing activities near human habitation, agricultural fields, water bodies, wildlife sensitive zones in the Aravallis be stopped, and alternative building materials be developed so that mining is no longer a threat for the hill range.

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