Submit report on encroachments and afforestation in hilly districts: NGT tells Kerala government

State Department of Environment asked to file additional report after the tribunal found an earlier report to be incomplete 

The National Green Tribunal has asked the State Department of Environment to file a report on the encroachments identified in the hill districts of the State.

The Southern Bench of the tribunal comprising Justice Pushpa Sathyanarayana, judicial member, and Satyagopal Korlapati, expert member, issued the directive while considering the report submitted by the department in connection with the massive landslides in Wayanad on July 30.

The tribunal, which took suo motu notice of the disaster based on the report published in The Hindu, said in its order dated September 27 that the report filed by the Director of Environment and Climate Change (respondent No.4) was incomplete, particularly the number of villages in Wayanad district as mentioned in the Madhav Gadgil Committee report [Western Ghats Ecology Expert Panel] and how many out of them were identified as landslide-prone.

The Bench asked the Department of Environment to file an additional report about the encroachers and the action taken for their eviction by the local authority. In its order dated August 2, 2024, it had asked the respondents to submit a report on seven aspects, including the number of encroachments identified in the hilly districts of the State and the number of illegal possessions removed since 2010.

It also stated that there was no answer to the question specifically asked for regarding the measures initiated for afforestation in the hill districts and also the afforestation done since 2010. Let the method and mechanism initiated to prevent the landslides in the hilly areas of the State of Kerala also be reported, it said.

The tribunal asked the District Collectors of Wayanad and Idukki to file a report on the seven queries that it had raised in the order dated August 2. The Bench suo motu impleaded the Kerala Forest Department as an additional respondent in the case.

Published - October 08, 2024 06:32 pm IST