The Central Empowered Committee (CEC) of Supreme Court has found that out of 20 govt projects for which conditional permission was given by the apex court for tree felling or translocation in the ridge area from 2016 onwards, only five have complied with the conditions.
Among the conditions that were not met by project proponents were compensatory plantation and the creation of a green belt at the site. The committee said the project proponents complied with norms until trees were felled or translocated, but after the construction starts, they paid no heed to other conditions.
For carrying out construction or any development work in ridge areas of Delhi, the agency concerned has to seek permission from Ridge Management Board, CEC and Supreme Court. The nod also has to be taken from the tree officer of Delhi govt and certain conditions are imposed by the Centre while approving the diversion of forest land for non-forestry use.
CEC, in its report dated Sept 4, said, “CEC has started the exercise of finding out the compliance status of the order of Supreme Court and noticed that the status of compliance is not strictly in the spirit of the orders of this court.”
The projects that complied with all conditions included NHAI (Dhaula Kuan); Delhi Transco Ltd; CPWD (Mahipalpur Bypass Road); Referral and Research (R&R) Army Hospital of ministry of defence, said the CEC report.
The report said the projects that did not fulfil any condition included National Capital Region Transport Complex, DDA, INS India, and ministry of defence. Some projects that did not meet some conditions were JNU, PWD, South Asian University, Power Grid Corporation of India, SDMC, NBCC, DDA, CBI, Delhi Police and Directorate of Revenue Intelligence.
“It is evident that a proper record of compliance with conditions imposed by Supreme Court has not been maintained by Delhi govt’s forest department and also by Ridge Management Board. It has also been noticed that while recommending a project of a certain agency, its compliance record of conditions imposed in previous proposals has also not been looked into,” said the report.
CEC said it would create a customised management information system to ensure compliance with Supreme Court orders and project proponents would be required to share details on the system.
“It recommended that all project proponents be given a grace period of six months to comply with the conditions imposed by Supreme Court for their projects and till such time their new proposals may be kept pending. If they fail to comply with the conditions even after the allotted grace period, then this court may like to take suitable punitive action against them,” said the report.
CEC also suggested that in if any agency or authority defaulted in compliance with any of the conditions imposed on any of its earlier proposals, any new proposal submitted by it should not be recommended by Ridge Management Board till compliance with all the conditions has been ensured.
Ridges are the green lungs of Delhi and the total ridge area available in Delhi is 7,777 hectares.
