FIR fails to halt felling of trees at Greater Noida factory

Around 500 trees were cut from a closed factory in Greater Noida without permission, despite an ongoing investigation by the forest department.

Around 500 fully-grown trees were allegedly cut from the premises of a closed factory in Surajpur area of Greater Noida on Tuesday, allegedly without due permission from the forest department, environmental activists have said, adding that the matter was raised two week ago, and despite the forest department filing an FIR in the matter, the illegal felling has continued.

The Gautam Budh Nagar forest department registered a case against the private company under the Tree Protection Act, 1976, around two weeks ago for allegedly cutting around 1,000 trees without obtaining permission from the department. (HT PHoto)

The Gautam Budh Nagar forest department registered a case against the private company under the Tree Protection Act, 1976, around two weeks ago for allegedly cutting around 1,000 trees without obtaining permission from the department.

A notice was also issued to the site superviser to produce ownership details, however, no response was forthcoming from the people concerned, said forest department officials.

“As per the inspections conducted on Tuesday, no such cutting of tree has come to the fore,” said Pramod Kumar Srivastava, divisional forest officer (DFO), Gautam Budh Nagar.

“An investigation into the alleged cutting of trees without approval is currently underway. A team has been pressed into action for conducting more inspections at the site,” he said.

According to the information from forest officials, the factory, located on around 1,200 bighas (1 bigha = 27,000 square feet in Uttar Pradesh) has been lying closed since the past several years but recently, some companies were in talks with the factory owners for purchasing the land and these companies were allegedly engaged in the illegal activity of cutting trees, officials said.

Environmentalists are of the view that the alleged activity cannot be carried out on such a large scale without the collusion of some forest department official.

“We brought the matter to the notice of forest officials earlier and we have again sought action against the persons involved in the illegal activity. However, it is not possible that the activity is being carried out without the knowledge of forest department officials,” said Vikrant Tongad, a local environmentalist.

Earlier this month, environmentalists alleged that around 1,000 fully-grown trees were felled from the same site.

A notice was issued to a supervisor found at the site during inspections and legal documents of the ownership of the place were sought by the department.

“The company is yet to submit a report of occupancy which was sought earlier. An investigation is underway,” said Srivastava.