Environmental Governance at Crossroads: Civil Society’s Fight Against Industrial Pollution in Kathua Industrial Area, Jammu and Kashmir

Abstract

As a key stakeholder within the domain of environmental governance, civil society influences the actions and outcomes of regulatory mechanisms and organisations, in addition to the state, market and communities. The research article attempts to understand the influence civil society exerts in addressing the environmental concerns of three village panchayats in Kathua district, Jammu and Kashmir, by studying the case of industrial pollution caused by Kathua Industrial Area. Issues like severity and impact of pollution on the affected population, awareness, participation and role of the civil society, and the ways in which the affected population negotiates with the problem of industrial pollution are analysed. It is found that civil society is unable to exert bottom-up pressure in influencing policy actions and outcomes in the study area. The reasons behind such an inability and the measures required to make civil society a reckoning force in environmental governance are also discussed in the article.