Don’t shield anyone, Supreme Court tells DDA on LG’s role in felling of trees

Probing deeper into who ordered the felling of the trees, the court pulled up the DDA for not producing records of the L-G’s visit to the site on February 3.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the Delhi government and the Tree Authority under the Delhi Preservation of Trees Act (DPTA) to initiate action against the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) for illegal felling of trees at the south Delhi ridge area and further deepened its probe to ascertain the role of the Lieutenant Governor (LG) Vinai Kumar Saxena in ordering the felling of trees, keeping the matter for further consideration on July 12.

The bench of justices AS Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan granted the body a week’s time to produce the records. (Sanjeev Verma/HT Photo)

Probing deeper into who ordered the felling of the trees, the court pulled up DDA for not producing records of the LG’s visit to the site on February 3 as an email written by a senior DDA official claimed that orders for felling trees were given by Saxena following the visit.

Granting the body a week’s time to produce the records, the bench of justices AS Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan said, “There should not be any attempt to shield anybody. You (DDA) admit there was a visit by LG and now it seems there is an effort to conceal information. The manner in which the entire thing has happened, we are entitled to have doubts. It is very difficult to believe there was no record kept of the LG visit. We are not happy with this approach.”

DDA vice-chairman Subhashish Panda, who is facing contempt before the court in a petition filed by a Delhi resident Bindu Kapurea, submitted to the court through senior advocates Maninder Singh and Mahesh Jethmalani that the records could not be traced and that to avoid any omission on his part, he was seeking additional time to find them. Singh said that the Member (Engineering) Ashok Kumar Gupta accompanied LG during the site visit.

The court said, “We direct the Member (Engineering) to file a detailed affidavit within 10 days on exactly what transpired during the visit of LG. He will also state if any oral direction or instruction was issued for cutting of trees,” while reminding the officer, “He will file the affidavit as an officer of the court and not as officer of DDA.”

The court also noted a letter written by DDA officer to the project contractor on December 29, 2023 for starting work on the road. Wondering how the go-ahead could be given when permissions under Forest Conservation Act, DPTA, and from the Supreme Court were pending, the bench asked DDA if this fact was considered by the enquiry constitute constituted to ascertain who commissioned the felling of trees.

The enquiry committee had identified three officers, including an executive engineer Manoj Kumar Yadav, for ordering the felling of trees. The court said, “Has the enquiry committee seen this letter? There was also an email about LG visiting and ordering cutting of trees. When such material comes to the committee, was it not its duty to find out LG’s role? Is the objective of the committee to save the higher ups and put the blame on some officers?

The court told DDA lawyers, “We have issued notice in contempt, that does not mean we want to send the DDA VC to jail, but he must come clean on who issued the direction to fell trees. He still must tell us if there is a cover-up to shield higher authorities. We are not going to run with a hammer against the authority, but we want truth to come out.”

A report by a three-member expert committee constituted by the court to examine the environmental harm caused by the road widening project undertaken by DDA recommended that work undertaken on the extended road be removed immediately and the ridge site restored by planting of saplings ahead of the monsoon season.

DDA pointed out that there was a suggestion by the committee to keep the road in question as a major hospital for central armed police force is coming up in the vicinity. The court rejected this. “We were aware one day you will make this submission to permit you to construct the road. There is enough land available elsewhere.”

The bench directed DDA to urgently implement the expert committee’s recommendations and said, “We are sure this is the tip of the iceberg. There would be hundreds of cases where trees would have been illegally felled that we are not aware of. A signal must go so that this does not go on.”

Singh told the court that the case has helped DDA identify its loopholes. But the bench remarked, “These are not loopholes. But this is a brazen act showing complete lack of understanding about the environment.”

On going through the report, the court realised there were lapses not just on part of DDA, but on the part of other authorities including the Delhi government’s environment and forests department and the Tree Officer under the DPTA, 1994. The court observed that on February 14, 2024 the principal secretary of Delhi’s forest department issued notification under DPTA for felling of 422 trees. The court directed notice on the contempt petition to be issued to the Delhi forest department through principal secretary and said, “Exemption was only for 422 trees, and by DDA’s own admission 633 trees were cut. Our impression is that many more trees beyond 633 were cut. It is an admitted position that DDA indulged in cutting 200 more trees than the purported 422 trees.”

The court sought an affidavit from the principal secretary by July 11 on why no penal action was initiated against DDA on this count.

The bench noted an urgent need to enhance forest cover in Delhi considering the unbearable summer this year. Passing an order, the court said, “Considering the ilIegal and high-handed acts of felling of trees as brought out in the contempt petition, we direct the Delhi government, DDA, and all civic agencies to convene a meeting with the three-member expert committee (comprising Ishwar Singh, Sunil Limaye and Pradip Kishen) to discuss comprehensive measures for enhancing green cover of national capital territory of Delhi.”

The court posted the matter for further hearing on July 12.