NGT seeks nature of 111km road linking Ghaziabad to Uttarakhand border

Ghaziabad: In the light of a suo motu cognisance taken by the National Green Tribunal regarding proposed felling of over 112,000 trees/plants alongside the proposed 111km Upper Ganga Canal road project, the tribunal has given three weeks’ time to the responding agencies to ascertain the nature of this road. The cognisance of the issue was taken on February 1 on how the UP government’s forest department allowed felling over 100,000 trees and shrubs in the protected forests of three forest divisions to construct two lanes of the road. The cognisance of the issue was taken on February 1 from a Hindustan Times report on how the Uttar Pradesh government’s forest department allowed felling over 100,000 trees and shrubs in the protected forests of three forest divisions — Ghaziabad, Meerut, and Muzaffarnagar — to construct two lanes of the road. The tribunal further directed that Uttar Pradesh is also required to disclose if any authority exists in the state “which classifies/notifies/declares the roads within the state as state highway, district road or ODR, and, if such authority exists, whether it has taken any decision to declare the stretch of road under consideration as state highway, district road or ODR”.