Notice to Punjab govt on plea challenging wood industry rules

CHANDIGARH: The Punjab and Haryana high court on Friday put the Punjab government on notice on a PIL seeking quashing of 2017 rules whereby the distance of any saw mill from the forest was reduced from 10km to 100metre.

The high court bench of justice RS Jha and justice Rajiv Sharma has put state government on notice on the plea of Just Sewa Society, an Amritsar-based NGO, for April 20, which had sought stay on issuance of any licence under “The Punjab Regulation of Wood Based Industries Rules, 2017:, notified by the government.

The PIL says the notification is illegal, unconstitutional and against the guidelines issued by the Supreme Court. The PIL demands that the state be asked not to issue any new licence to the saw mills without inspecting the status of availability of timber and other woods.

The court was told that the state failed to consider the fact that the forest areas of Punjab are already under pressure because of anthropogenic factors like rising pollution and climate change.

The court was told that the old as well as new saw mills have also to be assessed on the basis of their operating capacity and other operational instruments like vertical saw machines and raw machines installed for the purpose of increasing the capacity of saw mills before granting licence. It would out weight the availability of wood and in turn put into danger the existing state of forest in the state. Such an action thus violates the provisions and guidelines framed after the Supreme Court order, court was told.