The Delhi High Court’s sharp criticism and indictment of government officials for their lack of effective action against the encroachment of protected forest land by the builder mafia around Delhi may have exposed the government’s evident indifference to this issue.
A bench headed by Acting Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court, Justice Tushar Rao Gedela, who was hearing a public interest litigation (PIL), which had detailed the massive encroachment of forest land in and around Delhi, termed a recent reply filed by the Deputy Conservator of Forest (South) on the steps taken to identify and remove the encroachment as “perfunctory”. The forest department had on 4 January filed a status report on the extent of encroachment in the protected forests.
Justice Gedela, in his order dated 23 July said, “The Deputy Conservator of Forest (South) has filed a status report dated 4th January, 2024. To say the least, the status report is perfunctory in nature. It gives no details of the area encroached upon. It also does not mention the pendency of any litigation or status quo order with any specification. The Deputy Conservator of Forest (South) has not mentioned any step that it has taken for recovery of the encroached land. 2. The Deputy Conservator of Forest (South) is directed to file a detailed affidavit giving details of the litigations pending as well as the status of the stay orders within three weeks.” He listed the case for 5 September.
The first hearing in the case had taken place in August 2022 and since then, as the order of the High Court shows, the concerned government departments have taken a very light view of a serious issue the impact of which became evident recently as the Delhi-National Capital Region (NCR) was ravaged by extreme high temperatures and unprecedented heat waves, which has been attributed to the dwindling forest cove in the region.
Significantly, the government bodies, during the case hearing on 28 November 2023, had sought “further time to file the Status Report, indicating clear demarcation of the forest land and ascertaining the unauthorised”.
However, as the latest order shows, even after almost eight months, they have not ascertained the said details, raising questions, if there was an intent to get the required information, which as per the court documents filed by the petitioner will expose the nexus between top Indian Administrative Services (IAS) officials, political entities and the builder mafia, which has allegedly given these influential officials and individuals residential plots and flats in lieu of overlooking these encroachment of tracts of forest land that have been turned into farmhouses and zones for commercial activities.
In its 4 February report, this newspaper had brought out the extent of encroachment of forest land in Delhi. (Alarming encroachment crisis: Delhi’s forest land under siege). The forest department had revealed that roughly 400 hectares of protected forest green land area was encroached in Delhi till May 2023.
Shockingly, this is just the amount of forest land that has been encroached upon by what is termed the builder mafia. Other government agencies including the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, Delhi Development Authority and Government of Delhi, whose land too has been encroached on and have been made a party in the case, are yet to submit details about the level of encroachment on their land.
Sources said that a four-tower residential society in Chhattarpur, where each flat is being sold for at least Rs 6 crore, too has been built on encroached land. The permission from the relevant government offices was allegedly procured by the builder mafia while giving them gifts in cash and kind, including ownership of farmhouses and flats. All charges have been denied by sources close to the Delhi government.