ELI’s India Program, which for five years has been working to promote environmental law, policy, and management in India, hosted a lecture given by J. William Futrell Visiting Scholar M.S. Vani. Ms. Vani presented an overview of the relative strengths of local self government institutions Constitutionally and legally in the United States and India, the importance of local environmental decision making, and a comparison of the potential and practices in environmental decision making in the two countries. The lecture concluded with recommendations and suggestions on strategies for promoting local environmental law in the Indian context.
M.S. Vani is Law and Development Expert at the Development Centre for Alternative Policies, a public policy research and development organization with offices in New Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, and Uttaranchal, India.