Follow Us
Sushil Manav
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, February 15
The Haryana Government’s plan to amend the Punjab Land Preservation Act (PLPA), 1900, is set to cause extensive damage to the ecology of the National Capital Region (NCR), particularly the south Haryana cities of Gurugram and Faridabad, as the Aravallis will become the first casualty of the amendment.
The Aravallis in Haryana are protected by the PLPA. Sources said about 16,930 acres in 38 villages in Gurugram and 10,445 acres in 17 Faridabad villages have been notified under the PLPA. The notifications are valid for a period of 20-30 years, and then the land has to be renotified.
Already, most of these notifications were allowed to lapse and not renotified by the government, thus depleting the forest area year after year.
Going a step further, the Haryana Government now proposes to amend the PLPA in such a manner that will become inapplicable to the urban master plan areas. This will remove the protective shield of the PLPA in the cities and render the entire Aravallis open to the real estate.
The state government’s move has raised many an eyebrow even in the state’s Forest Department, said the sources.
The main impact of the proposed amendment will be felt in Faridabad and Gurugram districts as hundreds of acres currently protected by the PLPA will come out of its purview.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the Aravalli panchayat common lands of several villages near the Delhi border were conveniently privatised thereby allowing real estate interests to amass large landholdings in these villages.
In Faridabad, about 4,000 acres will be under threat of real estate, said the sources. Outside Faridabad city, the privatised Aravallis of Mangar alone cover 3,810 acres.
“On one hand, Haryana is trying to bring forest areas out of the purview of the PLPA while on the other hand, last year, the neighbouring state of Punjab renotified under the PLPA 21,944 acres in Shivalik forest, which was about to lapse. These areas were earlier notified under the PLPA in 2003 for 15 years. Haryana should also renotify the lapsed areas, and protect the Aravallis”, said Chetan Agarwal, a forest analyst.
“As Gurugram and Faridabad cities cover the plains, the Aravallis are home to the last remaining forests in south Haryana, a refuge for our wildlife and hundreds of species of plants. The ecological security of these cities will be gravely threatened,” Agarwal added.
The Aravallis are the most effective recharge zone for groundwater in this region. They serve as a watershed for nullahs and lakes such as Damdama, Dhauj, Badkhal and Surajkund and form a critical wildlife corridor between the Asola Bhatti sanctuary in Delhi and Sariska in Rajasthan.
Forest Minister Rao Narbir Singh did not respond to phone calls.
Protective shield to go