The Forest Department on Tuesday instructed the Indian Institute of Technology-Madras to stop removal of Prosopis juliflora ( seemai karuvelamaram ) from its premises.
Senior Forest officials on Tuesday said they had issued the instructions to the IIT-M administration as eliminating prosopis juliflora would affect the endangered blackbuck which has made the campus its home.
Though IIT-M was not technically forest land, the decision was made to protect wildlife on campus, a forest official said. “IIT is a Central government body. We have prosopis juliflora in Pallikaranai and for the birds and deer, the species is native. In the IIT-M campus, the karuvelams removed are from areas close to the human habitat. It will not spread since it has been concretised,” the official said.
At one time, the Guindy National Park and the Raj Bhavan, along with IIT-M, formed a wildlife corridor. With a wall coming up around the institute, some of the wildlife has remained in the institute.
“The institute took up the removal of the invasive species following a letter to the registrar from the Tahsildar of Guindy taluk on February 10,” said David Koilpillai, Dean, Planning, IIT-M.
“We had communicated to the officials that the campus is home to several animal species that benefit from the shade provided by the species, especially in the light of the trees lost due to Cyclone Vardah,” he said.
Deadline of April 10
However, since the G.O. had given them a deadline of April 10, they had to comply. “The Collector and tahsildar and their representatives are visiting the campus daily to check on the rate of removal,” he said.
“We are removing seemai karuvelam close to the roads and the main entrance. We had to use a JCB to pull out the roots that had in some places gone 15 feet deep. We explained our concern that the blackbuck depend on the species and we need tree cover for the animals, especially in the aftermath of Cyclone Vardah. So far, we have not touched the sensitive areas,” he explained.
In his response to The Hindu , Mr. Koilpillai further said: “At the insistence of government officials, a JCB has been employed to remove seemai karuvelam trees with deep roots. While complying with the High Court order, every effort is being made to avoid any other impact.”
