A day after expressing displeasure over the slow pace in which seemai karuvelam (prosopis juliflora) trees, an invasive species considered harmful to nature, were being removed from the district, Justice A. Selvam, the administrative judge of the Madras High Court Bench on Wednesday drove into the Madurai Collectorate to show the district administration that the trees were yet to be uprooted from their own official campus.
The judge began his inspection of seemai karuvelam removal works from Pandi Kovil in Ring Road and drove till the airport in Avaniapuram before entering the city and getting into the Collectorate much to the surprise of his entourage.
He then showed the growth of the trees near the entrance to a Government Automobile Workshop situated at the backyard of the Collectorate to the government officials and left the place saying: “I need not say anything more.”
Growth removed
Taken aback, Collector K. Veera Raghava Rao directed his subordinates to immediately bring an earthmover and uproot all those trees grown near the workshop. He also refused to move from the place until the officials brought the machinery and the work was completed.
Advocate Commissioners R. Gandhi, R. Karunanidhi and Mahaboob Fazil also stayed back with the Collector till the earthmover was brought in and the trees were removed from the campus.
Earlier in the day, Mr. Justice Selvam directed the High Court Registrar (Administration) V. Uma to open a separate bank account for mobilising money to uproot the seemai karuvelam trees by depositing the costs imposed by the court on the litigants in various cases. Court sources said that the direction was issued following a suggestion made by Justice P.N. Prakash who was told that scarcity of funds was one of the reasons for delay in uprooting the trees.
The account was opened immediately and a note was also circulated to all judges of the High Court requesting them to direct the litigants to deposit the costs imposed by them specifically in the bank account opened for the purpose of collecting money to eradicate the invasive species.
