39,000 trees in Maha to be chopped for Mumbai-Vadodara expressway

The district, which neighbours Mumbai and Thane districts, is already bearing the brunt of infrastructure projects such as the Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train and the Vadhavan port near Dahanu. Along with the Mumbai-Vadodara expressway

MUMBAI: The National Highway Authority of India’s (NHAI) greenfield project, the Mumbai-Vadodara highway, connecting Vadodara in Gujarat with Jawaharlal Nehru Port in Raigad district, could lead to large-scale destruction of green cover and the felling of over 39,000 trees in Palghar, Thane and Raigad districts of Maharashtra. Around 32,000 trees have already been chopped.

39,000 trees in Maha to be chopped for Mumbai-Vadodara expressway

According to NHAI’s response to a Right to Information (RTI) query, a 166.67-km stretch of the highway will pass through Maharashtra, for which 2,242 hectares of land, which include 304 hectares of forest land, will be required. The RTI reply states that 2,100 hectares of land have already been acquired.

Permission to cut 39,132 trees in Maharashtra has been sought and given—13,763 trees are in forest areas and 18,961 trees in non-forest areas, and 32,454 trees have already been felled. The construction plan also includes the demolition of 3,086 houses and buildings, 48 religious structures and 185 large warehouses. The Mumbai-Vadodara project is a part of the Mumbai-Delhi expressway.

Palghar district has significant green cover and is home to a large number of fauna besides a huge tribal population. The district, which neighbours Mumbai and Thane districts, is already bearing the brunt of infrastructure projects such as the Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train and the Vadhavan port near Dahanu. Along with the Mumbai-Vadodara expressway, the projects will cause a lot of damage to its green cover. When questioned, Anshumali Srivastava, chief general manager of NHAI, said that compensatory afforestation would be done for the lost tree cover. “We have already deposited the money with the Maharashtra forest department,” he said.

Environmental activist D Stalin of NGO Vanshakti, said that the “relentless onslaught on the state’s forests and virgin landscapes” needed to stop forthwith. “The ecological loss and the value of lost habitats can never be properly quantified,” he said. “Why is it that every forest must have traffic in it, on it or below it? Even if it is an underground project, the work does impact the surface during the construction phase. There is zero concern for the trauma caused to wildlife.”

In Maharashtra, the length of the highway from Boramal in Talasari (Palghar district) to Kaner in Vasai is 86.62 km, while Kaner to Morbe near Panvel (Raigad district) is 80.57 km. The RTI reply says that a total of 3,086 houses will be pulled down, the highest number being 515 houses in Talasari, followed by 462 houses in Bhiwandi, 441 houses in Kalyan, 416 in Dahanu, 415 in Vasai, 380 in Ambernath, 361 in Palghar, 90 in Wada and six in Panvel. These include some buildings in the Vasai area.

As far as religious structures go, 14 will be demolished in Dahanu, 12 in Talasari, nine in Palghar, and six each in Vasai and Bhiwandi and Ambernath. There are also many godowns and warehouses in the hinterland, and 185 in the highway corridor, including 58 in Bhiwandi and 54 in Ambernath.

The union transport ministry has maintained that once the project is complete, it will take lessen the load of container traffic going to JNPA via the Mumbai-Ahmedabad highway. Many of these trucks often crowd the roads of Thane city and also the Mumbai-Nashik highway. The NHAI is also constructing a tunnel under Matheran hill station to connect to JNPA, which is Maharashtra’s largest container port.

Anshumali Shrivastava, the chief general manager of NHAI, said that the Maharashtra stretch would be ready by May 2025. The 3.5-km tunnel under Matheran will be ready by March 2025. “The entire stretch in Maharashtra will be concretised and it will be an eight-lane highway,” he said. “We will provide wayside amenities like fuel pumps and eateries at a distance of every 50 km.”