Greens clash with panel over

Greens clash with panel over
TREE-FELLING
R Krishnakumar | TNN

Bangalore: It’s back on the road, again. As environmentalists counter the wideroad model of decongestion, the head of a court-appointed technical committee maintains it’s too late for an alternative.
Now, with both groups trading charges of incompetence and highhandedness, a deadlock seems imminent.
The ongoing treefelling drives in various parts of the city — both for Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP)’s roadwidening project and Namma Metro — have faced opposition over their potential impact on the environment. The sustainable development empowered technical advisory committee, constituted as a monitoring body
for these road works, has managed to have only one failed meeting with petitioners.
On October 31, the petitioners, including the Environment Support Group (ESG), had their first formal meeting with committee members.
According to the petitioners, the chairman of the 10-member committee — eminent environmentalist A N Yellappa Reddy — has been functioning in an autocratic manner and overlooked concerns raised by some committee members over the tree-felling drives.
“No decision has been taken on these objections. The affected parties are not being heard either. Contractors felling trees contend they have the BBMP tree officer’s permission. But the committee is expected to give its clearance to these drives which it hasn’t done,’’ says Leo Saldanha, coordinator, ESG. The committee chairman counters the charge and says some members — nominated by the petitioners — are too “preoccupied’’ to attend meetings and are creating misconceptions about the committee’s functioning. “The BBMP and the Metro Rail engineers are following the
right procedure. They first explain to us, through technical presentations, the need for such tree-felling whenever it happens. None of the officials have violated the court directive,’’ says Reddy.
Price of development
Many environmentalists have been slamming the allegedly misplaced priorities taken up during road-widening projects, highlighting the impact they could have on trees, footpaths, heritage landmarks and livelihood of thousands of people.
The rising number of vehicles in the city — currently over 30 lakh — has been left unchecked. Environmentalists who oppose the road-widening project contend that the cost involved (running into hundreds of crores of rupees) could, instead, be used to expand the Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation’s fleet of buses. “Do petitioners have an alternative solution at this stage, after the governments have cleared projects like the Metro Rail and the work has reached an advanced stage?’’ questions Reddy.
The high court had, in July this year, directed the BBMP commissioner to constitute the advisory committee following a writ petition against the road-widening project. More than 100 roads across Bangalore are being widened, triggering protests by residents and environmentalists. To take their cause further, groups have organized a walk on November 9, from Lalbagh West Gate to Town Hall.