Will Rahul Gandhi’s late entry into protest against tree cutting in Delhi save the green cover?

Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Thursday hit out at the BJP and the AAP over cutting of trees in the national capital for the re-development project and called for fighting the "madness".

New Delhi, June 29: Recently, we saw Delhi residents, including a large number of children, took to the streets to protest against the cutting of thousands of trees to build flats for government employees.

The protest--called as Delhi's Chipko Movement--has succeeded in temporarily stopping the felling of trees after the Delhi high court recently ordered a stay on all tree-cutting in the national capital till July 4.

The people's movement to save the green cover took a political colour after the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government in Delhi and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government at the Centre blamed each other for granting permission to cut the trees.

Amid all these drama and protests, Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Thursday hit out at the BJP and the AAP over cutting of trees in the national capital for the re-development project and called for fighting the "madness".

Taking to Twitter, he said, even children know the importance of trees in life and urged people to stand by the Congress against it. "In Delhi, the BJP with AAP's approval has hacked down thousands of trees in the past 4 years for development".

"Even children know that trees are critical to our survival and difficult to replace. Stand with the Congress and together let's fight this madness," he said on Twitter.

The city government had announced that it would be cutting over 14,000 trees for building over 25,000 flats for government employees in seven colonies of south Delhi.

A major protest broke out against the decision, with residents and activists launching their own "Chipko Movement" and the project became embroiled in a political blame game.

Reports say that the Congress is also planning to stage a protest in the national capital on Friday after the Arvind Kejriwal government in Delhi gave its go ahead for felling of 1,700 trees on Mathura Road.

Congress leader Yasmin Kidwai, who represents Nizamuddin East in the South Delhi Municipal Corporation, wrote to chief minister Kejriwal on Thursday wondering why Delhi government had cleared the felling of hundreds of trees on Mathura Road and in Sunder Nagar when it was opposing the Centre's decision to hack down 16,500 trees in south Delhi, reported The Times of India.