UN SDG's, Right to Environment, Role of NGOs in protection of Human Rights

Every monsoon, Mumbai's creeks, mangroves and drains decide whether a neighbourhood stays dry or floods. Every year some group of residents goes to court or to the ward office about a reclaimed wetland, a felled tree or a polluted nullah. Is a clean environment only a matter of municipal planning, or is it a human right, and who speaks for people who cannot afford a lawyer? This topic ties together three answers: the UN's Sustainable Development Goals, the growing right to a healthy environment, and the non-governmental organisations that push states to keep their word.

In two minutes

The 2015 Sustainable Development Goals set 17 global targets that overlap heavily with human rights, the right to a healthy environment is now recognised in international soft law and, in India, through Article 21, and NGOs act as the watchdogs, litigators and service providers that make both real.

The rest of this chapter

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