The new Delhi, 26 March (PTI) The Supreme Court’s note that cutting a large number of trees is worse than killing human beings should be a “exciting challenge” for the central government, which was “weakening” forest protection law, and the environmentalists said.
The Top Court made observations and rejected the plea of a man who chopped 454 trees in the Taped Trapezium protected zone.
“In the case of the environment, there should be no mercy. Baking a large number of trees is worse than killing a man,” she said.
Environmentalists welcomed a strong position of the top court in the field of forest and trees, but questioned whether the governments would take it seriously.
“This is a awakening for a central government that will constantly dilute the forest protection laws,” said Bhim Singh Rawat from the Network of South Asia in dams, rivers and people (Sandp).
He said the situation was particularly alarming in geologically fragile and climatically sensitive Himalayan states.
“Continuous pressure on extensive infrastructure projects, such as hydropower, dams, roads, tunnels and railways, led to a loss of thousands of hectares of untouched forests. This increased the risk of disasters, vulnerability and death in the region,” he said.
Minister of the Union Environment Bhupender Yadav on Monday said Lok Sabha that India had deviated 1,734 square kilometers of forest land, which is significantly larger (much more) than the overall geographical area of Delhi, for development activities in 10 years since 2014–2015.
Last July last year’s Minister for the Environment Kirti Vardhan Singh informed the lower house that since April 2019 957.25 square kilometers of forest area had been diverted.
He said that 881 projects were approved in national parks and the sanctuary of wild animals across the country during this period.
Meanwhile, Sandrp Rawat also claimed that the judiciary “could not” protect forests and, as an example, quoted the Char Dham All-Weather Road project in Uttarakhand.
Neelam Ahluwalia, an environmentalist and founder of people for Aravallis, said that India was very susceptible to climate change and faced everything from extreme thermal waves to floods with a glacier lake.
“Our forests and natural ecosystems are our only protective shields, but we are destroying them in the name of the so -called development projects. From (large) Nicobar to Hasdeo, Odisha, Northeast and Aravallis, forests are axed all over the country,” she said.
Ahluwalia said illegal, uncontrolled mining in Aravallis devastated green coverage, food and water sources in already stressed areas.
In 2018, the Central Committee of the Supreme Court announced that 31 Aravalli Hills – demolished mining disappeared in Rajasthan.
“Along with hills, vegetation and green cover, it also goes. Real estate and mining destroyed the hill across the Aravalli range 692 kilometers and created 12 violations from Ajmer in Rajasthan to Mahendergarh, Haryana, allowing the desert to proceed towards the Indo-Gangetic level.
She also claimed shortcomings in compensatory afforestation and stated that a petition given by her group in the Supreme Court, which challenges the rules of green loans, emphasized several reports for the control and general auditor (CAG), which show extremely low plantation survival, some up to six percent.
“Compensation afforestation is not a solution for the destruction of virgin forests for roads, railways, mining, buildings, solar farms and hydropower projects. In this climate crisis, we simply cannot afford to ax and destroy our existing trees, forests and ecosystems further,” she said.
However, Guman Singh, the coordinator of the Himalayan political campaign, disagreed with the blanket statement of the Supreme Court against the cutting of trees and called it “unscientific perspective”.
“The forest residents in mountain and wooded regions depend on the trees for their livelihood-for the construction of houses, firewood and tool production and tools. It is said that the trees cannot be cut at all because it would damage these native and traditional forest communities,” he said.
Singh accused modern development policies for extensive deforestation.
“Forests and large trees will be lost due to infrastructure projects such as expansion of roads, large dams, urbanization and construction. These so -called development policies must be stopped,” he said.
“I cannot agree with the unilateral perspective of the Supreme Court, but I definitely agree that the destruction of millions of trees for large projects must be strictly stopped. We also have to create new mixed forests on a large scale,” he added.
Vivek Agarwal, the director of the country (India) in Tony Blair Institute for Global Change, said the trees and forests were the first defensive line against deterioration of extreme weather events.
“Moreover, the fulfillment of the Indian NDC (national contribution) of the collateral to create another carbon sink of about 2.5 billion tons of carbon dioxide equivalent to 2030 requires rapid forests.
The environmentalist and activist of RTI Amit Gupta said that the loss of the green cover causes more intense heat waves.
“Temperatures have exceeded 40 degrees in a number of countries, which is unusual for this part of the season, and the situation has become unbearable due to uncontrollable felling of trees,” he said.
Thousands of trees are cut for roads and highways, changing asphalt surfaces to thermal trap. Compensation afforestation does not help, because agencies do not always set trees near the areas where forests were lost, Gupta said.
Catch all commercial reports, intelligence violations and the latest update of the Live Mint. Download Mint News and get daily market updates.
Business Newsnewsindiasis Note to cut trees Awakening call for government, tell environmentalistsMoreLess (Tagstotranslate) Supreme Court (T) Tree Cutting (T) Listers Protection Acts (T) Environmentalists (T) Climate change
