Providing the State Government a final opportunity to submit its reply regarding its decision of not considering any wooded area less than 10 hectare or with tree density of less than 60 per cent as deemed forest, the high court of Uttarakhand has stated that if the reply is not submitted within two weeks, the principal secretary of forests and the principal chief conservator of forests will appear in the court on February 26.
The division bench of justice Sudhanshu Dhulia and justice NS Dhanik issued this direction on Tuesday while hearing on a public interest litigation filed against the government’s decision regarding classification of deemed forests.
Hearing on the petition, the division bench directed that the state government should submit its reply within two weeks. In the past the court had directed the state to file its reply within three weeks. However, till now, no reply has been filed on behalf of the state government. In the past, the high court had stayed the decision of the state government regarding deemed forests.
According to the case details, Nainital based environmentalist professor Ajay Rawat, Vinod Pande and Renu Paul had filed separate PILs stating that on November 21, 2019 the forest and environment section of Uttarakhand had issued an order. As per this order, any wooded area covering less than 10 hectare or with less than 60 per cent density would not be classified as deemed forest.
The petitioners have contended that this was an official order which cannot be executed as it is neither a government order nor has it been passed by the cabinet. The order was passed in order to provide benefit to some select persons, it was averred.
The petitioners have further stated that as per the Forest Conservation Act, 1980, about 71 per cent forest area is declared in the state which is divided into different categories of forests. However, there are some areas which have not been placed in these categories. The petitioners have stated that such areas should also be brought under forest categories so that the exploitation or clearing of such areas can also be stopped.