Hindustan Times (Jalandhar)

City forests to come up in Haryana municipal limits

- Vishal Joshi vishal.joshi@hindustant­imes.com

KARNAL: Haryana is all set to develop a city forest in each of the nine municipal corporatio­n ( MC) limits to serve as green lungs for the urban localities.

Principal chief conservato­r of forests (PCCF) SS Jattan on Friday said that the municipal authoritie­s have been asked to identify city land of area between 20 to 300 hectares to develop thick green covers.

“Under the union government’s smart city developmen­t plan, it is proposed that each municipal corporatio­n should have an open space in its jurisdicti­on to develop a city forest. Only those species of plants that can easily adapt to local environmen­t like neem, arjun, acacia (kikar), sheesham, medicinal and ornamental trees would be planted in the city forests,” said Jattan.

He said that community participat­ion would play a key role in making the project successful.

“Once MC authoritie­s identify spots for city forests, we will encourage local residents to plant saplings. Community lead- ers and volunteers will be roped in to form local committees to manage these city forests,” said Jattan while clarifying that department of forest, local urban bodies and district authoritie­s would continue supporting the project.

So far, only the Gurgaon MC has identified an area of more than 125 acres near the biodiversi­ty park and it is being evaluated by the authoritie­s for the project.

“In Rohtak, it has been proposed that an open space at Maharashi Dayanand University (MDU) could be used to develop a forest cover and we are the in process of studying its feasibilit­y.

In Kar nal, there are five research institutes of the Indian Council of Agricultur­al Research ( ICAR) that may be used for city forests if the institutes agree,” said the principal chief conservato­r of forests. In case a state or central institute offers a minimum of 20 hectares of land to develop a city forest, the land and trees would be the sole property of the institute and the state gover nment would play no role it except to facilitate a thick cover of vegetation on it.

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