Egmore eye hospital restrained from cutting down trees on campus
CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has restrained the Regional Institute of Ophthalmology and Government Ophthalmic Hospital at Egmore from cutting down 75 trees in its campus to pave way for the construction of additional buildings.
A division bench comprising Justice Vineet Kothari and Justice C Saravanan granted the interim stay on a plea moved by an ex-service man Capt P B Narayanan seeking to safeguard the trees.
The petitioner, a resident of the locality adjacent to the hospital for the past 14 years submitted that the 75 full grown trees with wide canopy serves as a habitat for birds including black kites, parakeets, mongoose and other animals.
But unmindful of that the authorities have embarked on removing the trees in a patch of four acres, which has aided in it supporting biodiversity that has become extinct in other parts of the City, he said. Also, on noting that the Ophthalmic Hospital, said, to be the second oldest hospital of its kind in the world cannot embark upon such ecologically destructive and environmentally deleterious activity, the petitioner said, “While the hospital needs additional buildings for its functioning, the same can be constructed in the space available on the same campus which is adjacent to nursing quarters where such old trees are not found.”
Further, citing that Chennai lost substantial number of trees during Cyclone
Vardah and whatever left today must be protected, he said the claims of relocating the trees within the campus is not a viable option as most of such fully-grown trees would not survive
While the hospital needs additional buildings for its functioning, the same can be constructed in the space available on the same campus, which is adjacent to nursing quarters, where such old trees are not found
—The petitioner
such relocation.
The services rendered by a full-grown tree during its 50-year life to the ecology is quantified as 3.55 crore and it is very crucial that we preserve such tress particularly in urban localities like Egmore, he added.