Environmental Protection Fund Under Section 16: Fines From Air, Water, Environment Acts

Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change notifies the Environmental (Protection) Fund Rules, 2026 to streamline use of the Environmental Protection Fund. The notification operationalises utilisation, allocation, and oversight arrangements for a fund constituted under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986.

Environmental Protection Fund (Section 16, Environment (Protection) Act, 1986):

Dimension	Key Details
Legal basis	Constituted under Section 16 of the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986.
Account location	Governed by placement in the Public Account of India.
Corpus source	Fines under the Air (1981), Water (1974), and Environment (1986) Acts.
Allocation formula	Provides for 75% of funds to be remitted to States/UTs and 25% to be retained by the Centre.
Utilisation heads	Mandates earmarking for monitoring networks, remediation of contaminated sites, and R&D in clean technology.
Oversight mechanism	Managed by a Project Management Unit and audited by the CAG.
Institutional capacity support	Provides for financing the strengthening of regulatory bodies like CPCB and SPCBs.