Cut the trees, face the heat

The soaring mercury level in the past few weeks is one of several direct fall-outs of indiscriminate tree-felling and criminal destruction of green cover. As climate change has become a global phenomenon, there is no denying the fact that Assam and Guwahati too have contributed towards this. This newspaper, while relentlessly highlighting the menace of tree-felling and green-cover shrinkage, had only a few weeks ago reported that Guwahati has been witnessing rapid destruction of trees in recent years. The reserve forests in and around the city have been encroached upon by hordes of land-hungry people, mostly under the patronage of various political parties. The authorities have happily granted permission to construct buildings – government or private – by destroying Guwahati's green hills and wonderful wetlands. Most government organizations and educational institutions in the city do not have adequate greenery. Trees in the capital complex are fast disappearing. The latest glaring incident of tree-felling in the capital has occurred on the Khanapara-Jalukbari stretch of the national highway. A large number of trees were drastically cut down to convert the four-lane highway into six-lane. Most people taking that highway have been disturbed by seeing the way the trees on the divider and on the sides were destroyed. There are a number of NGOs in Guwahati which boasts of working for the environment. But not even one was seen raising a voice against this indiscriminate act. Likewise, no one has also tried to find out exactly how many trees were felled, and whether it was possible to uproot the trees (since most of them were apparently between 5 to 10 years old), keep them elsewhere for the time being and replant them once the road widening was completed. One simple RTI query is enough to find out the number of trees felled, as also to get a copy of the decision taken to fell those trees, along with names of the officials concerned. The National Highway Authority of India (MHAI) definitely has some guidelines for protecting trees or compensatory plantation when highways are being constructed or widened. It was only a few months ago that this newspaper had reported that the Supreme Court of India was not happy over the manner in which trees are being felled while widening or constructing highways. The apex court had observed in November last year while disposing of a PIL relating to tree-felling for construction of roads in West Bengal that the authorities concerned should explore all alternatives to tree-felling. The top court also observed that the government should think of the cascading effects of tree-felling on the environment. Those officers who are responsible for felling the trees were definitely not directed by the Chief Minister to cut down the trees.