In 2019, Bangladesh joined the ever-growing list of countries to recognize rivers as living entities with legal rights. The Bangladesh Rivers case is another example of advocacy from the Supreme Court in Bangladesh, and the article explores the relationship between the executive and the judiciary, and the ongoing role the judiciary has played in water law reform. The Court based its decision on a novel reading of the Constitution, linking the legal rights of the rivers to the public trust doctrine and the human right to a healthy environment. This foundation is itself potentially controversial, and the new legal status of the rivers may set their interests against those of the people who live along and rely upon them. By making comparisons between this case and similar decisions in India and Colombia, the Bangladesh Rivers case can be seen as part of the transnational movement to grant legal rights to rivers.
Unsustainable groundwater abstraction is now an acknowledged problem in Bangladesh. Current water laws, policies, and institutions are widely recognized to have failed in addressing this problem effectively and efficiently. Moreover, the relevant laws and policies are themselves defective and deficient in controlling the free-style extraction of this precious resource, and compliance is very weak. The institutions responsible for enforcing the legal regulation of groundwater abstraction are also weak, fragmented and patchy. Against this backdrop, this paper investigates whether judicial activism could be one of the avenues to promote the sustainable abstraction of groundwater resources of Bangladesh. The Supreme Court of Bangladesh could be a catalyst in facilitating, though not ensuring, the sustainable abstraction of groundwater resources, not least it could declare laws as well as promote compliance and enforcement by applying its unique judicial activism tool. The Court has made a laudable contribution to the protection of the environment. Despite the intrinsic connectivity of water (both surface and ground) with environment, Court's activism in relation to this resource is very poor and limited, and this is more true in relation to the protection of groundwater resources. In fact, till date the Court has not explicitly dealt with the groundwater depletion issue, and as such judicial activism has not found its way to tackle this menace.
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