Forest department stalls road to temple, but 26 trees felled

NOIDA: The forest department of Gautam Budh Nagar stopped the construction of a road within the Surajpur forest area on Wednesday night but by then, 26 trees had been cut by local villagers.
Officials said that the villagers were trying to construct the road to approach a local temple, which is located within the forest area.

“The total length of the road required to reach the temple is around 500 metres. Of this, 350 metres are outside forest limits. The villagers said they secured permission from the office of MP Mahesh Sharma to construct the remaining part of the road inside the forest. However, we stopped the work when we saw that not only had they started building the road inside the forest but also felled 26 trees to make way for it,” said district forest officer PK Srivastava.

According to the forest department, the villagers had been working late at night to build the road. However, some local activists informed a few environmentalists, who in turn alerted the forest department. The forest officials stopped them at night, but by then, 26 trees of keeker variety had been felled. “This is shocking. The forest department needs to be more vigilant. The way these villagers have cut trees to create a concrete road is a gross violation of the Forest Protection Act,” said environmentalist Vikrant Tongad.

Repeated calls to MP Mahesh Sharma for a reaction went unanswered.