While President Pranab Mukherjee pulled out of attending the valedictory function on Sunday, speculation raged today over whether Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate the event on Friday.
Facing criticism, Art of Living Foundation chief Sri Sri Ravi Shankar rubbished allegations of any damage to ecology saying no tree has been felled and that they would build a biodiversity park in the area.
All eyes were on the proceedings before the National Green Tribunal which questioned the Centre as to why no environmental clearance is required for erecting structures on the Yamuna plains for the event.
"You (MoEF) file an affidavit by tomorrow and tell us why no environmental clearance is needed for raising temporary structures on flood plains," a bench headed by NGT chairperson Swantanter Kumar said.
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The green panel also questioned the building of pontoon bridge by the army on the river bed for the festival and asked the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) counsel as to who gave the permission for setting it up.
DDA, Delhi government, MoEF said that they have no role in the grant of permission for setting up the pontoon bridge.
Management Authority has granted permission to the event only conditionally while no permission has been granted by police and the fire department.
During the hearing, DDA said that the plea seeking stay of construction activity was filed with a delay after activity had started at the site and it needs to be dismissed.
It said that constant watch is being maintained that no debris or municipal waste is being dumped in Yamuna flood plains and a running contractor is there to remove the debris, if any dumped.
The bench then said that DDA just can't wash its hand off by saying no debris is there as the photographs on record does show the presence of waste at the site.
Advocate Rajiv Bansal appearing for DDA backed the authority's decision to grant permission for the event saying that it has given the nod with conditions that no permanent construction will be permitted without permission from the competent authority.
Art of Living (AOL) in its submission said that it had taken the requisite permissions from all the authorities except from the police which is subject to permission from fire department and they have fulfilled all the conditions.
It asked all the parties to consider the impact of the such a event on the environment, river, ecology and biodiversity.
Meanwhile, environmentalists raised the red flag ruing that over 1000-acres of the sensitive area between Delhi and Noida, predominantly marshland, stand shorn of even a "single blade" of grass.
Activist Anand Arya, who filed the petition to stop the event claimed not only the areas natural "undulating" terrain has been "levelled", pesticides have been sprayed in the floodplain to kill mosquitoes which has adversely affected the lives of a variety of birds, insects and reptiles.
Another petitioner Manoj Mishra of Yamuna Jiye Abhiyaan questioned the "legality" of the event, and said the area, being destroyed "every moment", will take a long time to recover and slammed the organisers for the "lack of understanding" on their part.
"The natural habitat has been totally devastated. It's the biggest form of violence one can imagine. The red beeds, marshlands have been levelled which house insects and reptiles. The argument that they will plant trees is laughable. You don't plant trees in marshlands," Mishra said.
Earlier in the day, he told the media that his organisation will leave the place after building a biodiversity park.
"In the past, our volunteers have brought out 512 tonne of garbage from Yamuna. We have not cut any trees, have just trimmed four. We want a clean Yamuna and we care about the environment," he said.