By – Khushi Choudhary
Abstract
The growth of renewable energy in India is commonly presented as an unquestionable environmental good, both a substitute for coal and an important part of the country’s commitments to fighting climate change. This article complicates such a narrative by looking at the current dispute taking place in western Rajasthan over the cutting down of the state tree of Rajasthan, the Khejri tree (Prosopis cineraria), in connection with the development of solar energy projects in the region. This article reveals how the conflict between environment and development can be seen as a failure of two essential legal principles that must govern any energy transition process: the principle of proportionality in land use decision-making and the principle of participation of the community in the decision-making process regarding the construction of the energy projects.
Introduction
As India continues to push towards fulfilling its climate and renewable energy goals, the legal and environmental paradox becomes evident in the Thar Desert. Rajasthan has established itself as one of the leading states in generating solar energy through its arid environment by setting up more than 22,860 MW of solar power capacity and aiming at 90 GW by 2030. But the green energy projects have been made at the expense of the reckless destruction of the natural flora of the place, mainly the Khejri tree (Prosopis cineraria).
This process of cutting down these sacred trees to pave the way for private solar projects has revealed the existence of major weaknesses in the environmental governance structure in India, where the concepts of proportionality and procedural justice have become very relevant. As the Rajasthan High Court has noted, the destruction of the vital ecological lifeline in the name of technological development of solar energy constitutes a ‘breathtaking irony’. This article analyzes the Khejri felling crisis as an important case study of climate policy implementation.
Ground Zero of the Green Transition: Solar Expansion, Procedural Blindspots, and the Khejri Crisis
In order to understand the legal void in this issue of solar transition, one needs to first comprehend the huge displacement of the environment taking place in the western part of Rajasthan. In the past few years, 1.50 lakh bighas of land have been allotted to private solar plants. According to environmentalists, about 30 lakh trees, mainly Khejri, have been felled to make way for the installation of solar panels. To reach its energy goals in 2030, the developer will need an additional 1.92 lakh acres of land, which will lead to the felling of another 38.54 lakh trees. The micro details mirror the same picture, where almost five lakh trees have been cut within 14 years in Bikaner district itself.
The reaction to this has come in the form of large-scale protests. These protests were localized at first; an example of this is the 568-day sit-in protest conducted by a farmer on his land in Naukha Daiya that stopped the further cutting down of trees by a leading solar company. In February 2026, the Bishnoi community initiated the Khejri Bachao Andolan.
The Missing Metric: Proportionality, Ecological Costs, and the Judicial Void in Solar Expansion
Over the last decade, proportionality has become the dominant standard used by the Indian courts for evaluating whether an act of the state that infringes a fundamental interest is valid. It was after Modern Dental College and Research Centre v. State of Madhya Pradesh (2016) that the court, further reinforced in Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017), replaced the earlier deferential standard of unreasonableness, known as Wednesbury, with the proportionality principle. This involves four steps: first, the act should serve a legitimate objective; second, the act is appropriate for achieving the objective; third, there is no other way that would achieve the objective with lesser interference; and fourth, the act does not disproportionately affect the interest holder in comparison with the public advantage gained.
However, the failure is not particular to proportionality review in Rajasthan’s solar energy industry because there is also a general criticism of Indian proportionality jurisprudence, which notes that the judiciary is quick to rely on the four-part test in theory but unwilling to apply the necessity test in practice, reducing a systematic inquiry process to a rather lax rationality assessment procedure. In light of the above facts, one cannot help but notice that while proportionality review in a constitutionally mandated court has been found wanting in terms of being a preventative tool against violations of fundamental rights, it would be surprising to find that proportionality review has played a role of any significance at all in the decision-making processes of the administrative and revenue departments before Khejri covered land could be made available for solar power production.
If proportionality analysis is to play any protective role with respect to the issue of renewable energy at all, it cannot continue to consist of an occasional judicial pronouncement in response to litigation initiated only after the trees have been cut down. It must be incorporated into the administrative process whereby land is classified, allocated, and cleared.
The Deficit of Consent: How Rajasthan’s Solar Transition Bypasses Community Consultation
While proportionality review considers whether a decision is justified on substantive grounds, community participation addresses the earlier procedural question of who should have the opportunity to voice concerns before the decision is made. In this regard, the legal framework for the implementation of solar energy deployment in Rajasthan is perhaps even worse.
There are two factors that result in this weakness of the framework. First, there is the structure of the environmental clearance procedure in India, where solar and wind power generation plants are automatically exempted from going through the environmental clearance procedure based on the claim that the projects are benign for the environment.
The second is the classification of the land itself. The land in question for solar power projects in western Rajasthan is largely Orans, community-held sacred groves, which have served, generation after generation, as the unofficial commons for grazing, fuelwood collection, and religious purposes by Bishnoi pastoral communities, among others. Under the displacement criteria stipulated under the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (LARR Act), a Social Impact Assessment is required when a project displaces 400 families in plains regions, or 200 families in tribal, hilly and Fifth/ Sixth Schedule areas. However, because few families live in Orans, many solar power projects fall short of this minimum criterion, even though they cover extensive areas of land used primarily for grazing.
The consequence of the automatic exclusion of solar power projects from Environmental Impact Assessments creates an exemption problem that ensures that projects can avoid carrying out any environmental impact assessments. This, together with the erroneous categorization of Oran as agricultural land, results in the systematic exclusion of community participation in the solar energy transition of the state. The community learns of the solar use of its grazing lands only after fencing, felling, or construction work has started, at which point the only option left open is that of protest, legal action, or both, as shown in the Khejri Bachao Andolan and the resulting PIL.
Institutionalising Proportionality: Reforming Environmental Clearances and the LARR Act
Nothing discussed herein is an argument against solar power, nor against Rajasthan’s part in India’s energy revolution. Rather, it is an argument against an energy revolution which unfolds in the absence of legal oversight. Four reforms would move the ball forward in addressing the legal vacuum pointed out above.
First, there needs to be no escaping environmental clearance requirements just because the technology being used is renewable. Second, the recognition of Oran and other community lands needs to emerge separately from how such lands are recognized today in terms of revenue law. Otherwise, any procedural reform at the back-end will not stop the allocation of Oran lands as if they were vacant government lands.
Third, the thresholds set for displacement that will lead to a social impact assessment in terms of the LARR Act must consider the seasonality and occupation of land, so that pastoral and grazing communities are not excluded from the consultation process simply because they do not inhabit the land on which they rely. Fourth, proportionality analysis must be institutionalized at the stage of decision-making, and not raised merely during judicial review after litigation. As discussed earlier, previous instances of unscrutinized infrastructure development demonstrate the crucial need to institutionalize these four safeguards before project implementation.
Conclusion
This particular case has managed to happen despite the necessary precautionary measures and checks, proportionality assessment, and participation that should have accompanied a land use decision of such magnitude. Not only is the cutting down of Khejri trees in Bikaner and other parts of Rajasthan an environmental issue, but it is also a symptom of a transition process that is happening faster than the framework through which this process is supposed to be controlled.
About the author
Khushi Choudhary is a final-year LLB Hons student at Jindal Global Law School. Her research interests lie in the area of environmental law along with constitutional law.
Image Source: https://india.mongabay.com/2025/09/a-beloved-tree-of-life-is-vanishing-from-an-already-scarce-desert/ [Image by Nirmal Verma/Mongabay]