Natarajan's bid to clean up forest bureaucracy spoiled

The higher echelons of forest bureaucracy have played spoilsport in environment minister Jayanthi Natarajan's bid to clean up amid allegations of in-efficiency and shoddy work. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: Sep 25, 2011, 23:26:45 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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The higher echelons of forest bureaucracy have played spoilsport in environment minister Jayanthi Natarajan's bid to clean up amid allegations of in-efficiency and shoddy work.

Natarajan ordered the immediate transfer of AK Rana, chief conservator of forests and in-charge of ministry's Bhopal office, following allegations of him favouring project proponents in violation of norms.

The whistleblower was his subordinate Sujoy Banerjee, another IFS officer, who alleged that Rana had circumvented the provisions of the Forest Conservation Act to give permission for diversion of forestland.

"It is my humble submission that working in this office is becoming exceedingly difficult as I can only watch helplessly as ecologically valuable forest lands are squandered away in this manner and certain parties bestowed upon with favours," Banerjee said, in his representation to environment secretary T Chatterjee.

Natarajan was quick to act after the issue was brought to her notice and ordered Rana's transfer on September 14.

JK Tewari, chief conservator of forests, ministry's regional office, Bhubaneswar was asked to take charge from Rana.

The order, however, has remained on paper as Rana continues to clear projects in the Bhopal office. On September 18, he cleared a dozen projects including diversion of forestland for laying pipeline in Narmada district of Madhya Pradesh.

It has happened as forest bureaucracy in the ministry failed to direct Rana to immediately hand over charge to Tewari despite the minister's directions.

Earlier, Natarajan desire to suspend another Indian Forest Service (IoFS) officer, CD Singh, who had allegedly misused her file noting to approve a hydel project in Himachal, was blocked by the ministry officials.

He was sent back to his parent cadre, Himachal Pradesh, after the minister insisted on disciplinary action against the official, who dealt with clearing projects at the central level.

The clean up job started in the wake of a letter written by non-official members of the Forest Advisory Committee, mandated to consider all proposals for forest diversion, alleging huge discrepancies in the proposals submitted before FAC. The letter, signed by FAC members Mahesh Rangarajan, Ullas Karanth and Amita Baviskar, had accused the forest bureaucracy of conducting shoddy work so that the projects are cleared.

"From the bottom up, state forest departments/governments are routinely approving even obviously damaging projects ... We are being forced to take decisions on the basis of inadequate and inaccurate information," the letter said.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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