The Bombay High Court on Monday has ordered the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) to explain by February 16 how it issued a public notice seeking to fell 177 trees in the Aarey Colony area for the Metro car shed project when the Supreme Court only permitted felling 84 trees in 2022.
Acting Chief Justice (ACJ) SV Gangapurwala and Justice Sandeep Marne were hearing a PIL filed by activist Zoru Bathena challenging the BMC’s notice.
The tree authority had issued a notice for the removal of trees obstructing construction work of “shutting Neck at Sariput Nagar,” Aarey Colony for the Colaba-Bandra-SEEPZ metro line. The notice was issued in response to an application filed by the Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Ltd. (MMRCL). The deadline for submitting objections and suggestions for tree felling was January 23, 2023.
Petitioner Bathena claimed that “the notice dated January 12, 2023, issued by the tree authority is for removal of 177 trees, having a different set of tree ID numbers in comparison to MMRCL’s application, which was for only 84 trees”. Bathena claimed that the notice violated the Supreme Court order of November 2022, which only allowed felling of 84 trees.
During the hearing on Monday, BMC advocate Aspi Chinoy told the court that the 177 trees include the 84 trees mentioned by the Supreme Court. “The remaining trees are mostly shrubs and a few wild trees that grew after 2019 (when the MMRCL filed its first application seeking to fell 84 trees),” Chinoy explained.
Bathena’s lawyer, Zamaan Ali, argued that because these trees have been assigned ID numbers, they cannot be classified as shrubs or wild trees.
The bench, too, inquired Chinoy “Where did we get the idea that these are shrubs? In addition, the Supreme Court order is dated November 20, 2022. This order only deals with 84 trees. Why was it not brought to the attention of the Supreme Court at the time that there are more than 84 trees that need to be removed? The question is whether these are shrubs or trees, the ACJ stated.
Ali then asked the court to stop the BMC and MMRCL from doing anything at the site. Chinoy assured the court that nothing would be done until the petition was heard.
The metro car shed project at Aarey Colony in suburban Goregaon has sparked outrage, with environmentalists protesting indiscriminate tree felling in the area, which they claim is a forest.
After taking power in 2019, the Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi government halted car shed construction in Aarey and relocated it to Kanjurmarg to protect trees. However, with the change in government in June 2022, the Eknath Shinde-led state government reversed the decision and stated that the car shed would be built in Aarey Colony itself, and work was then resumed.
