On one hand, incidents of uprooting of trees in city are increasing day-by-day, while on the other hand, Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) dissolved the Local Tree Committee on Tuesday. The Tree Committee was responsible for allowing or disallowing tree-felling in the city for any construction project.

The committee was formed on February 25 and it was dissolved within four months.

According to the sources, the administrator dissolved all committees of the Municipal Corporation and the Tree Committee is also among them. There were about 10 members in the Tree Committee, including Municipal Commissioner, four environment experts and five corporators. In last four months, the committee conducted only one meeting in which about seven issues of tree-felling were tabled. Environment experts

raised concern about the tree-felling and also urged to conduct site visit before giving permission.

After dissolving the committee, the fate of all applications is in balance atleast till the municipal elections. However, the uprooting of trees due to thunderstorm and other reasons are increasing in the city before this monsoon season. Environment experts claimed, the uprooting of trees is due to the depleting ground water table and concretisation in the city.

Another full grown tree near GPO square got uprooted on Tuesday and damaged vehicles parked under it. There is nobody atleast till the elections to lend an ear to the plight of the victims in the civic body after the dissolution of the Tree Committee.

“Tree committee getting dissolved suddenly is shocking for us, because the committee lasted for hardly 3 and half months and we couldn’t do much for saving green cover of our city,” said Kaustav Chatterjee, Member, Tree Committee and Founder of Green Vigil Foundation.

“Maybe, a temporary committee can be formed with experts for attending the urgent cases till the new permanent committee is constituted. With recent amendment in Maharashtra Urban Tree Act, the scope as well as duties of Tree Committee have been enlarged to a large extent, hence a developing city like Nagpur must have a Tree Committee in place,” claimed Chatterjee.

Another Tree Committee member Sachin Khobragade said, “There is no provision of dissolving the Tree Committee in Maharashtra Urban Tree Act. The administrator can take charge of Tree Committee only when it has not been formed.”

“Nagpur Municipal Commissioner has violated the Section 3 of the Act and he took charge to allow tree felling,” claimed Khobragade.