Update on Aarey Colony: Bombay High Court gave 5 days to BMC to reply about Tree Authority decision.

By Abhay Shah, Realty Quarter

On Wednesday, the Bombay High Court granted the BMC five days to respond to a petition lodged against the decision of the Tree Authority to remove 2,646 trees for the Metro III car-shed from Aarey Colony.

The court did not give a stay as the BMC acknowledged that there was still permission pending to cut trees, although the decision had been taken. The next hearing will take place on 17 September. On August 29, the Tree Authority endorsed the proposal, after which the petition was filed by environmentalist Zoru Bathena.

The plea mentions minutes of meetings and asserts that the decision has already been made without considering thousands of citizens’ objections. The petition affirmed that all tree experts adopted the resolution without written input and neglected to record grounds for variations in the panel.

The civic body pointed out that there is a clause under the Tree Act that allows anyone to appeal the decision within 15 days. The copy of the order has not been yet uploaded to the BMC website and the BMC has assured the court that trees will not be chopped until further judgment has been made.