GVMC to impose fine on EPDCL for indiscriminate felling of trees

We have informed about it to the Discom CMD, says Commissioner

The trees chopped by the EPDCL staff near Akkayyapalem in Visakhapatnam

The Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation (GVMC) to impose hefty penalty against the Andhra Pradesh Eastern Power Distribution Company Limited (APEPDCL) for indiscriminately cutting down trees as part of maintenance of power supply lines.

This was decided by the GVMC here on Friday after avenue revenue trees in a half-a-kilometre stretch were reportedly chopped down indiscriminately, without following any norms or obtaining prior permission from the civic body, between the Fourth Town Police Station and Kancharapalem.

GVMC Commissioner G. Srijana said that the civic body would impose penalty for not only cutting down the trees, but also for not lifting the axed branches.

“We have also informed about it to the Chairman and Managing Director (CMD) of the EPDCL,” she said.

According to M. Damodar Rao, Assistant Director of Horticulture Department, GVMC, the APEPDCL workers could have pruned the branches at the top of the trees, if they were creating obstruction to high-tension wires.

“But what is the necessity to chop off the trees? Even some saplings were also removed,” he said. Many of the trees were old ones, which have survived many cyclones, he added.

This is for the second time in less than a month some amount of green cover was destroyed in the city. Earlier, around 200 metres of green cover was destroyed by the Engineering Department of the GVMC near Arilova.

Meanwhile, environmentalists have expressed concern over damaging the green cover and sought protection of trees.