It’s official: Aravallis’ sandy area not in protected zone

Bhartesh Singh Thakur
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, March 19

Apprehensions of environmentalists have proved right as the Haryana Government has excluded ‘bhood’ areas of the Aravallis in the NCR from the National Conservation Zone (NCZ), giving realtors freedom to develop projects there.

A state-level committee led by AK Singh, Principal Secretary, Town and Country Planning, put its stamp on the exclusion during a meeting in New Delhi on February 27. Documents showed how ‘bhood’ continued to be deliberated upon for over four years.

It is defined in revenue records as a kind of land having 70 per cent sandy soil. During a meeting to discuss the outcome of NCZ delineation on July 6, 2015, it was decided that ‘bhood’, not covered in the forest category, would be included in the ‘status yet to be decided’ category.

In a meeting to discuss interpretation of ‘bhood’ and foothills in the demarcation of NCZ areas on December 17, 2015, the Gurgaon Deputy Commissioner, in a letter dated November 18, 2015, recommended that ‘bhood’ and foothills be kept out of the NCZ.

He was of the opinion that neither the Aravalli notification nor any other guidelines classified these as eco-sensitive zones. He was of the view that ‘bhood’ being a part of the Aravalli range was only an interpretation.

Principal Secretary, Forests and Wildlife, Amit Jha, said it was decided in a meeting on August 20, 2015, that ‘bhood’ and foothills “are integral part of the Aravalli mountain range and will be kept in the category of ‘status yet to be decided’ within the NCZ category temporarily till criteria of forest are decided by the Supreme Court”.

After detailed deliberations, it was decided that only land contiguous to the Aravallis or ‘gair mumkin pahar’ (uncultivable) areas and recorded as ‘bhood’ in revenue records would be included in the NCZ category as being an integral part of Aravalli range. In cases of segregated chunks separated by agricultural land, ‘chahi’ (irrigated) land or land put to any other use, the same might not be included.

Later, then Gurgaon Deputy Commissioner TL Satyaprakash, in a letter dated April 6, 2016, wrote that ‘bhood’ area had been “interchangeable and synonymously used as foothills”, which was an “erroneous” interpretation.

He added that a lot of these areas were being used for private cultivation and hence, limiting any land use by way of an NCZ could only be a fallacy. According to him, 1,113.2 hectares were initially considered contiguous ‘bhood’ area, but based on present revenue records, only 66.4 hectares could be classified as ‘bhood’.

On March 3, 2017, a meeting was held under Chief Secretary DS Dhesi to take final view on the area categorised as ‘status yet to be decided’ under the NCZ in the NCR.

“It was recommended that all ‘bhood’ areas recorded as such in revenue records, whether or not adjoining ‘gair mumkin pahar’, need to be excluded from any NCZ category,” read the minutes.

The meeting held on February 27 this year to discuss ground truthing surveys for ‘confirmed’ and ‘status yet to be decided’ category relied on the meeting dated March 3, 2017, for excluding ‘bhood’.

Forest activist Chetan Aggarwal said ‘bhood’ areas in the Aravalli foothills had scrub vegetation. “These should be deemed as forests. These help in groundwater recharge. About 1,000 hectares is under ‘bhood’ in Gurugram. The decision should be reviewed,” he said.