In Noida, barren trees is becoming a common site. Trees are being chopped off indiscriminately to make space for electric wires and cables. Private property owners are also chopping off parts of trees near their properties and the government agencies seem to be unmindful of this.
However, on Monday, the National Green Tribunal issued notice to the Forest and the Environment Department of the Government of Uttar Pradesh and Noida authority on a petition filed by an NGO called Friends.
Friends’ general secretary Sharad Tiwari, a resident of Noida, moved the NGT highlighting the indiscriminate chopping of trees. He raised the issue after he found many trees in Sector-62, Noida had been severely chopped off and many of them had no branches.
“Many of the trees had been chopped to such an extent that they were almost deprived of all the leaves and only trunks were left,” said Mr. Tiwari.
He said he was informed that the trees are being cut by the Electricity Department as the branches of the “victim trees” were interfering with the electricity wires.
When he contacted the Divisional Forest Officer of Noida in November and wrote letters, too, he didn’t get any response and even the e-mail id on the government website turned to be incorrect.
Mr. Tiwari said such incidents of chopping trees by government agencies themselves would make the general public non-serious about environment as he noticed that trees in residential society Jeevan Ashray had also been chopped.
Mr. Tiwari prayed that “exemplary action must be taken against those guilty and a scheme be made to remove electricity wires passing through or from near trees. He also demanded that nobody should be allowed to chop off trees even growing inside private properties.
