Chief Minster Harish Rawat wrote a letter to the Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Saturday seeking a green bonus of Rs2000 crore from the Union Government, the media in-charge of the Chief Minister, Surendra Kumar, said.
In his letter, the Chief Minister said that the green cover also provides service to the world by sequestering carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. 64.8% of the area of Uttarakhand is under such forest cover and grasslands and is managed by the forest department as well as participatory local bodies called the ‘Van Panchayats’.
The Thirteenth Finance Commission has only sanctioned Rs51 crore this year for the management of forests, as per working plan prescriptions and hence can nowhere be considered even close to a ‘green bonus’. He added that the Government has recently increased the ex gratia payments to the victims of man-animal conflict. Now, the dependents of persons killed by wild animals can get an ex gratia payment of Rs3 lakh instead of the earlier Rs1 lakh.
The rates of payments to owners of agriculture land depredated by wild animals have also been increased up to ten times the earlier rate.
“Despite having limited resources, the State Government is spending more on the forests than the direct revenue they get out of them. The State Government also suo motto banned the commercial felling of green trees above 1000m altitude to protect our environment sacrificing huge revenue which could have been earned out of it. We raised this issue before the Planning Commission at the time of approval of Annual Plan 2012-13 and before National Development Council meeting held on 27 December, 2012,” the CM has further added.