Green Chamber
The Green Chamber serves as a dedicated venue for building critical legal knowledge through grassroots engagement, legal research, and movement-based, pro-community litigation. Our mission is to equip judges, lawyers, law students, indigenous activists, and community advocates with the legal tools needed to advance climate justice, using both local and international legal forums.
Our work spans strategic public interest litigation (PIL), legal capacity building for young lawyers, and partnerships with bar associations to embed climate justice in the legal mainstream.
What We Do
1. Strategic Litigation: We pursue high-impact court cases to protect ecosystems, uphold public rights, and hold governments accountable.
2. Legal Education: We’ve trained 20+ young lawyers in climate and rights law, and over 500 journalists on the legal dimensions of energy, air quality, and health.
3. Right to Information (RTI): We use RTIs as a tool for legal research and government transparency, gathering vital public data to support our cases.
4. Movement Lawyering: We partner with bar associations, student groups, and community organizers to grow a pro-people legal movement for climate justice.
Cases That Made an Impact
a. The legal team has opposed the Malir Expressway (renamed Bhutto) in the environmental tribunal and high court, while following a complaint to the Asian Development Bank (ADB) on grounds of damage to climate resilience of the Malir River ecosystem, as a result of which ADB (and UK’s FCDO) decided to discontinue their funding for the project.
b. Two Indus River delta islands, which were part of the 1927 'protected' forest, were returned to their protected status through an official government notification obtained through the high court order after an 'illegal' government 'notification' from 2010 (excising them) was successfully challenged. Mega-developers had publicized plans to urbanize the islands locally known as Bhandaar (Bundal) and Dingi (Budho).
c. Through its Green Chamber, CAC secured a High Court stay order against illegal sandmining in Kirthar National Park, stopping the environmental damage. This was later upheld by the court when challenged by the government in March 2025.
