Afforestation funds used to defend deforestation case

Rajmeet Singh

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, August 19

Environmentalists in Punjab have questioned the Forest Department’s move to spend lakhs of rupees from the Compensatory Afforestation Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) funds to defend a deforestation case before the National Green Tribunal (NGT).

In this case, a protected forest was illegally passed off as a non-forest area to allow felling of 24,777 trees on the banks of the Bist Doab canal. The funds in question are meant to plant trees under compensatory afforestation.

Dr Amardeep Aggarwal, an environmentalist who had sought information under the RTI Act on spending of CAMPA funds, said, “The department not only allowed felling of trees in forest areas, but also used CAMPA funds on contesting illegal deforestation. The guidelines have been violated to justify deforestation and department irregularities.”

The department spent around Rs 86 lakh on the fee of senior advocates to defend the case before the NGT and the Supreme Court, he said.

The NGT order to the state government and the Forest Department to undertake compensatory afforestation on area equivalent to the forest area destroyed along the Bist Doab canal is set to cost around Rs 2 crore, sources said. The cost of afforestation has to be recovered from the Irrigation Department, the agency that widened the irrigation canal.

Meanwhile, the Vigilance Bureau (VB), which initiated a probe into the felling of over 24,000 trees in 2017, under a canal rejuvenation project undertaken during the then SAD-BJP government, is yet to submit its report. The record pertaining to tree-felling in the Nawanshahr and Phillaur forest divisions had been summoned by VB officials. The range officers of the forest divisions concerned were also quizzed.

In the light of the NGT order, Conservator of Forests (Hills) Harsh Kumar has claimed that departmental rules were tweaked to dispose of the felled trees at 25 per cent less that their reserved price. In September 2016, the then Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (PCCF)-cum-Managing Director of the Punjab Forest Development Corporation had moved a case before the Secretary (Forests) to permit the auction of trees at 25 per cent less than the market price. The Secretary had granted permission. Later, the corporation raised a bill of Rs 65 lakh to the Irrigation Department to compensate for the loss suffered by it due to the disposal of the trees at lower prices.