The State forest department has started marking the trees coming in the way of execution of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambitious all-weather road project in the region. According to official sources, about 10,000 trees are likely to fall in the way of the highway project on the stretch from Rishikesh to Chamba. This work is expected to address problems like landslides which recurringly block roads in the mountainous regions.
The State forest department has started marking the trees which will come in the way of widening of the highway stretch from Rishikesh to Chamba. After submitting a report in the case and receiving approval from the higher authorities, the Uttarakhand Forest Development Corporation will start work on axing 10,920 trees coming in the way of the highway widening work.
It will be recalled that in the previous year during December, the prime minister Narendra Modi had laid the foundation for the `12,000 crore Char Dham highway development project. As part of this project, a 144 kilometre stretch of the national highway number 94 from Rishikesh to Dharasu is to be widened at a cost of `1687 crore. It should be mentioned here that at present this stretch of the highway is quite narrow in various places, apart from which danger zones are also a problem at various spots on this highway. The authorities claim that following the execution of the highway development project, such stretches of the highway will not be affected adversely by heavy rain and flood like situations. Due to this, the people will not have to face the recurring problem of blocked roads often encountered during the rainy season especially in the mountainous regions of Uttarakhand. Along with the widening of the road, the project also includes work on strengthening the mountain slopes in places where the road is vulnerable to damage from landslides.
Under this project, the highway in question is proposed to be widened to 12 metres. Some time ago, the officials of national highway and the forest department jointly conducted the work of survey for counting and marking the trees coming in the way of the highway widening work. Recently, the forest department team began the work of marking the trees at Agrakhal along the highway slated for widening.
According to officials of the forest department, about 6993 trees between Rishikesh and Agrakhal, falling under the Shivpuri forest range have been counted and marked. In addition to this, about 4,000 trees have been counted and marked along the stretch of the highway from Agrakhal to Chamba falling under the Saklana forest range. Now after the marking of the trees, the forest development corporation will start working on cutting these trees after the necessary approval is received from the higher authorities.
The Saklana forest ranger Buddhi Prakash said that for the highway widening work 1557 trees have been counted on reserved land and 1368 on civil Soyam land along the stretch from Agrakhal to Dikhol village in Chamba. Work on marking these trees has been started after the counting.
Additionally, work has also started on marking the 1002 trees counted on measured land in the said area. Soon, after the completion of this work, a report will be submitted to the higher authorities.
The forest development corporation will take necessary action after the approval is granted by the authorities, he added.