1,671 trees felled by BBMP in four years

Bengaluru: Bengaluru is becoming a concrete jungle day by day and the greenery is diminishing. Trees are being felled in the name of development works, Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has cut down 1,671 trees for various projects in the last 4 years.

According to a report prepared by IISC in 2014, Bengaluru has only 14 lakh trees. There is one tree for every 16 people. It was warned that if this continues like this, the number of trees will decrease and the greenery will decrease along with the level of pollution will also increase. However, the destruction of trees in the city is increasing due to development works and other reasons. 1,671 trees have been cleared from 2019-20 to 2022-23.

Thereby the green is further reduced. Trees are cut down for many reasons like construction of Bengaluru flyovers, road widening, Namma metro works. After applying to the BBMP Forest Department, the trees will be felled by the personnel appointed by the BBMP Forest Department. Also, private persons are prohibited from cutting trees.

More felling of trees in 2019-20

Thus various development works in Bengaluru saw more cutting of trees in 2019-20, around 632 trees were felled that year. In addition, 535 trees have already been felled in the current year. 169 trees have been felled in the last 4 years for metro project and 24 trees have been axed for Baiyappanahalli railway project. There is a rule that if one tree is cut down, 5 saplings should be planted instead. Accordingly, BBMP has planted 3,93,923 saplings since 2016-17. Out of which not a single sapling was planted in 2018-19 and 2021-22. Also, there is an allegation that the BBMP, which plants saplings, is not doing its maintenance adequately.

Thus, it is estimated that more than 20% of the 3.94 lakh saplings have been destroyed. The BBMP Forest Department has set a target of planting 2 lakh saplings in 2022-23. For that, it has been informed that saplings will be supplied through BBMP nursery at Kudlu in Bommanahalli, Kempapura in Mahadevpura, Attur in Yelahanka and Jnanabharathi in Rajarajeshwari Nagar. However, only 71,500 saplings have been cultivated in the nurseries against the target of planting 2 lakh saplings. Considering this, it seems that BBMP forest department has no willpower to increase greenery in the city.

BBMP had planned a tree census three or four years ago to find out the number of trees in the city and the species of trees. In this regard, the officials had announced that they would set aside Rs 5 crore and conduct census work through GKVK. However, the BBMP officials were not interested in doing the tree census citing other reasons including Covid.