82 eucalyptus trees cut down for babus’ safety at Chandigarh Secretariat in Sec 9

Asked who gave the permission, he said, “I am not in the committee. But there were orders from Home Secretary to get these dangerous trees cut.”

The officer added, “Moreover, we have decided to gradually phase out the eucalyptus trees in the city. There have been many incidents. So, we are pulling them down. Also, we are planting three saplings in place of one pulled down tree.”

The officer pointed out that cracks started appearing in the trees and once a branch fell on a car damaging the vehicle badly.

Mayor Anup Gupta told The Indian Express, “We are just the executing agency. We don’t take decisions in case of pulling down a tree.”

Time it takes for the common man to get permission to cut tree

After the Carmel Convent School incident where a tree fell on students who were having lunch that killed one student and critically injured several others, The Indian Express had reported how it takes months or even years to get approval to fell the branch of a dangerous tree in Chandigarh.

The application has to clear over a dozen channels and if there are objections, it takes several months or years. A senior official of the horticulture wing had stated that a report is prepared first with photographs when an application is received. The condition of the tree is inspected after a field visit. Some residents said that it takes months to get the horticulture official for field inspection.

The file then moves from the executive engineer of the horticulture department to superintending engineer. From there the file goes to the chief engineer and from there to the principal secretary (home) who further sends it for approval to the adviser. He then sends the file to the forest department (chief conservator of forest) who then tasks his staff with cross-checking after carrying out an inspection and preparing a report.

If there is no objection, the report is sent to the chief conservator who then gives a final nod and sends the file back to the adviser,who sends it back to the chain involving the principal secretary home, chief engineer, et al. Finally, the sub-divisional officer and junior engineer concerned decide to chop the tree.

A retired judge from Sector 9 had that time even stated that how he had been running from pillar to post for the last six months to get a heritage tree near his house pruned.

However, UT claimed that the procedure had been simplified. They had said that the decision of a single window system had been taken.

Not just this, as departments like the engineering department and the forest department would keep passing the buck, accountability has been fixed and stated that it is the secretary forest that will give approval.

R K Garg, social activist, said that UT knows how to sideline rules for itself.

“They forget and sideline all rules while accomplishing their dubious goals for themselves. In fact, administration many a time behaves insensitive to all its own rules and directions. We the people do not have any say at all in the absence of any public representative,” he said.