Over 200 students held a rally in Goregoan on Friday morning to show support for the Save Aarey project and protest against the cutting of trees to build a car shed for the Mumbai Metro 3 project.
The rally was organised by students of Pragya Bodhini High School with the help of Amrita Bhatacharjee, an environmental activist, who recently filed a petition against the car shed, which is proposed to come up on the banks of the Mithi river.
Seema Shaikh, principal of the school, said, “We support the environmental activists who have been working towards saving Aarey. As a responsible institution, we wanted to spread awareness of the problem in the locality.”
Ms. Bhatacharjee said that it was encouraging to see children being part of the initiative. “Many a time as adults we tend to overlook such crucial issues and seeing kids take up the responsibility is just amazing.” Ms. Bhatacharjee said, “Metro is a red category industry and the car shed cannot be built on the banks of a river as discharge contaminate it.
“Moreover, the BMC had rejected the proposal to construct the car shed and instead marked Aarey as a green zone in the final draft. Despite the disapproval, the construction has begun and the debris is being dumped near the fencing of the river,”
The petition was filed in the Bombay High Court on Friday and will be heard on October 30.
A spokesperson from MMRC in a statement said, “The car depot is nerve centre of Metro Line lll which is an important part of changing the public transport scenario in Mumbai. State government after scrupulously following legal procedure under MRTP Act has issued the final notification of change of land use at 33 ha land in Aarey from NDZ to Metro car depot and allied activities and MMRC is executing the car depot construction within a proper legal framework.”
