Right from our early student days we have learnt about the importance of trees and the inexhaustible benefits they bring to us. Besides supplying us with many life’s essentials like oxygen, food, shelter and medicines they also help purify the air we breathe by reducing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and maintaining balance in the ecosystem.
As we evolved, discoveries have been made on the advantages of having trees, with their role expanding to satisfy the needs created by our modern lifestyles. They have added value to community and social life, beautifying our gardens, parks and playgrounds. They deflect the sunlight, reduce the heat and avoid our eyes from being hurt. But above all, it is their ecological and environmental importance that should concern us most, particularly due to climate change and flooding which many States have witnessed and which have not spared us either, though on a smaller scale.
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Needless to say that besides improving air quality, which is deteriorating in crowded cities, trees also help in conserving water, preserving soil, removing dust, absorbing pollutants and supporting wildlife. By moderating the effects of the rain, sun and wind, they control the climate and lower the air temperature. Finally, their roots hold the soil, prevent erosion, absorb and store rainwater, recharge groundwater supply and prevent flooding.
With such endless benefits the trees provide or rather with known adverse effects of their depletion, it is inconceivable that our Government which, hopefully, has its senses and thinking powers in place, should invite trouble for their State, which, thank God, has not seen the worst yet.
It is painful to observe that the Government, which ought to have taken special interest in preserving our tree cover to protect our environment and ecology, seems bent upon doing exactly the contrary to satisfy the greed of the Central Government and its friends and the builders. We do realise that if we want broader roads and other developmental projects, cutting of trees is inevitable. Also, those which endanger human life and property may also need to be felled. But often we can and must find ways and means of saving some, wherever possible, or just trimming them, especially the very old ones. In fact, this has been done at some places where they have been retained, even in the middle of the road, by having a roundabout or a one way street and others which pierce through compound walls or roofs, adding to the beauty of the construction.
What is unfortunate is that generally there aren’t any sincere efforts in maintaining them. It is understandable that a few trees may have to go to make way for a house or a small building in settlement area. But that is not the case. With real estate being the greatest attraction nowadays because of the big money involved, our trees, hills and low-lying areas are the targets, with non-settlement zones being easily converted in exchange for some bundle of notes, to make way for buildings. Real estate and not environment is today the priority. This decimation of trees and hills will come to haunt us one day.
It is reported that between 2010 and 2019 around 89,000 trees were felled in Goa with the permission of Forest Dept which approved 99.3% of applications received and rejected only 0.3%, keeping others in abeyance. We know it too well that hundreds or perhaps thousands of trees have been and are being chopped, without necessary permissions. It is a regular happening almost every week, at times without the knowledge but sometimes with the blessings of either or both the Panchayat and Forest Dept. While stop work order is often issued, generally after massive destruction is done, we rarely hear of any action taken thereafter, because Ministers and/or bigwigs are invariably involved.
Indiscriminate and unnecessary chopping of age old trees for unwarranted excessively broad highways, Mopa airport, the three controversial linear projects, even in forest areas and wildlife sanctuary, has been object of severe criticism and vociferous protests by activists and environmentalists. People recall with much pain how dozens of banyan, fruit bearing and rain trees were felled for widening the main road in Fatorda and the Margao-Colva road at the time of BRICS summit in 2016, which is yet to be fully tarred, despite a lapse of five years. The process of mercilessly destroying trees for expansion of highways, at Mopa, Mollem, etc, is very much on with brazen arrogance and shameless despotism, with any opposition being put down with brutal force.
Recently, the Margao Municipal Council decided to indulge in a similar exercise of cutting down or trimming 135 trees in the city. An amount of 10 lakhs has been earmarked for the work. No Forest Dept expert was involved in selecting the condemned trees. It would rather appear that the list was casually prepared without any serious study of the real need for cutting/trimming the trees, perhaps to oblige some voters. On inspection of the sites, it was observed that some of the trees slated to be trimmed were already fully cut, some to be cut need only trimming, a few have been badly trimmed and some were just overgrown plants, which were perhaps included to justify the expenditure. In fact, some trees which have branches hanging dangerously over the roads, have not been included.
Environment and ecology need be of great concern to us and felling of trees and cutting of hills should be resorted to only in extreme circumstances, making every effort to save them. The citizenry need to remain alert to ensure that this happens to protect our environment and avoid future catastrophes.
(The author is a retired banker)
