Ensure trees aren’t cut needlessly or wantonly: HC
NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court has expressed its concern over the cutting down of fully grown trees and said that it would be logical and prudent to transplant such trees instead of cutting them down and the self-defeating exercise by the Forest Department of the Delhi government needs to be arrested at the earliest.
Justice Najmi Waziri, while dealing with a contempt plea concerning the preservation of trees, noted the petitioner’s claim that a tree is cut down every hour in Delhi under official sanction and sought information from the Deputy Conservator of Forests (DCF) on the number of trees that were permitted to be cut down in the last three year.
The judge said that it would be appropriate that the Tree Officers give due consideration to transplantation of each tree that is sought to be cut before granting any further permissions and observed that a Tree Officer is a repository of public faith and trust that trees which form an essential part of people’s lives are not allowed to be cut needlessly or wantonly.
The court further said that the Tree Officer’s statutory duty necessarily requires assessment of the necessity to cut a tree for the project for which the permission is sought and that he would have to spell out the reason for grant or denial of permission to cut down trees in their orders.
It would be appropriate that the Tree Officer(s) give due consideration to transplantation of each tree which is sought to be cut, before granting any further permission for cutting of trees. This would entail inspection of the trees which are sought. This would entail inspection of the trees which are sought, the court stated. The contempt plea by Neeraj Sharma, represented by advocate Aditya N Prasad, pertains to the trees in the Vikas Marg area in East Delhi.
Justice Waziri, in the order, emphasised the importance of even a solitary tree in any neighborhood and stated that compensatory afforestation which is a geographically distant and nascent compensatory plantation can hardly be of any respite or actual compensation .
This is a worrying issue because on the one side endeavour is said to be underway to maintain and augment the green cover of Delhi while simultaneously fully grown trees are allowed to be cut down. This self-defeating exercise by the Forest Department, GNCTD needs to be arrested at the earliest. It will be logical and prudent to transplant fully grown trees instead of cutting them down, said the court in its order dated April 28.
Compensatory afforestation if at all carried out, on the fringes of the city, far removed from the congested areas of human habitation, where the sole decades-old-tree once stood as a carbon-sump-cumfresh oxygen generator-cumshade provider-cum- a visual respite from the ever-increasing concretization; the geographically distant and nascent compensatory plantation can hardly be of any respite or actual compensation. In any case, it will take decades for the compensatory forests to be of any reckonable benefit, said the court.
The judge also directed the DCF to disclose the number of trees that were transplanted and the instances and details of compensatory afforestation which have been completed.