HC bans tree felling

Shimla, Jun 2 (UNI) The Himachal Pradesh High Court has imposed a complete ban on felling of trees and implementation of the timber distribution (TD) rights policy in the state, stating that the ban will remain in force until the court's adjudicates on the issue.

The court in its order said neither the state government nor any functionary of the state would permit felling of any tree nor allow timber be given to anybody or be used by anyone under the TD rights until it adjudicates on the issue.

The order was passed after taking a suo moto note of illegal felling of trees in the state following a letter written to the State Chief Justice by one Rattanjeet Singh.

The letter said politicians had failed to protect the forest wealth of the state due to lack of will among them and the bureaucrats to prevent the misuse of TD rights.

The influential people of the state, in connivance with government officials of revenue, forest and police departments, were misusing TD Rights.

Under the TD Rights Policy, a person was allowed to fell a tree once in 10 years for his personal use, while people were cutting trees three or four times than the allotment.

Issuing notices to Chief Secretary and Chief Conservator Forests, a division bench comprising Chief Justice Vinod Kumar Gupta and Justice Deepak Gupta said ''until we adjudicated upon the issue, we have no intention of extinguishing the rights as such with respect of timber distribution, but certain interim directions are necessarily required to be passed.'' The state government and all its functionaries, including state forest corporation, would be responsible for the implementation and compliance of these directions in letter and spirit, the court added.

UNI AS PS SB BD1817