Silvassa residents welcome Bombay High Court's stay

Silvassa, Aug 30 (UNI) The two week's stay granted today by the Bombay High Court has come as a relief for Subhash R Rakshe who filed a public interest litigation (PIL) against the administration of Dadra and Nagar-Haveli (DNH) this month.

Mr Rakshe filed the PIL through his lawyer C M Kothari that the DNH adminstration has revised the 2001 draft development plan, affecting the green zone as originally envisaged.

The plan was implemented in 2001-02 which delineated 20,321 hectares as reserve forest out of the total area of 49,190 hectares.

It allowed 2,406 hectares for rivers and streams while the balanced of 26,372 hectares comprised areas for industrial, urban and green zone. The plan stated that in every five years the same would be revised.

However, controversy broke lose on July 11 this year when the revised draft plan increased land allocation for industries, while opting for a hefty cut of the green zone.

As per the original plan, 11.9 per cent of the land was for urban zone while in the revised draft it was 11.80 per cent, which meant an extra 187 hectares of land was allocated for the urban area.

For the industrial zone it was 10.67 per cent in 2001, but after changes it was raised to 20.51 per cent which meant another 2,595 hectares were added to industrial belt.

For roads, the original plan had allocated 1,134 hectares of land, but in the revised draft an extra 150 hectares were added.

The petitioner contended that the revision has affected the three zones and the green zone was the most affected.

The green zone originally had 73.94 per cent comprising mostly of agriculture land and the wildlife reserve. Now, it is 62.95 per cent. Agriculture has affected to the tune of 2,899 hectares, the PIL contended.

The petitioner further contended that by hitting the green zone, the Administration has violated the National Environment Act and added that it was also violation of the Central Forest Ministry's notification on September 14, 2006 (serial no SO 1533).

The Town&Country Planning Act 1974 too has been violated, Mr Rakshe contended.

Granting the stay, a division bench of Justice J N Patel and Justice Sayyed asked the administration to file its reply within two weeks.

UNI