India
SC considers giving its nod to all tree felling | India News – Times of India
Underscoring the need to do something to stop tree felling, a bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Augustine George Masih issued notices to the Delhi government and tree officials, asking them to respond by November 22 . conditions and manner in which trees may be felled.
Senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan and advocate Manan Verma, appearing on behalf of the petitioner, highlighted the grim picture of continued felling of trees in recent years and said that the green cover of Delhi, because the authorities constituted under the Delhi Preservation of Trees Act (DPTA), have failed to check this. is exhausting.
“There are procedural safeguards in place within the DPTA that are clearly visible in the flow of the law, in which the protection and conservation of trees precedes the regulatory mechanism for tree felling. These procedural safeguards have been grossly breached,” it said. petition.
“Section 7 of the said Act clearly states that it is the responsibility of the Tree Authority to ‘preserve all trees within its jurisdiction’,” the petition said.
‘The Tree Authority has met eight times since its establishment’
Referring to data collected by the Delhi forest department, Sankaranarayanan told the bench that according to the latest figures, an average of five trees are cut every hour. The total number of trees allowed to be felled under official sanctions for the years 2019, 2020 and 2021 in all categories was 1,33,117, bringing the annual number of trees to 44,372.33, which amounts to over 5 trees per hour (2019- 2021).
The petition, filed by Delhi-based environmentalist Bhavreen Kandhari, alleged that a comprehensive review of all meetings of the Tree Authority revealed that the authority had met only eight times since its inception in 1995 until March 2021. Accordingly, it should meet at least 104 times until July 2021, as per its legal mandate,” the petition said.
Accusing the authority of not following SC directions, the petition said: “The law framed by this court has great significance for Delhi as the National Forest Policy stipulates that one-third of the total land area of the country should be under forest must lie. or tree cover.”
“However, it is pertinent to note that till date, Delhi has not met the norms prescribed in the said policy. According to the India State of Forest Report 2021Delhi’s forest cover is 13.1% and tree cover is 9.9%. Therefore, the total green coverage is approximately 23%, as against the 33% mandated by the said policy,” the report said.
