Documents show Delhi LG issued directions to cut trees in violation of court orders: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court on Monday asked Delhi Development Authority (DDA) to clarify whether directions to cut around 1,100 trees in Delhi's ridge forest area in violation of the Court's orders were issued by Lieutenant Governor Vinai Saxena in his capacity as DDA Chairperson [Bindu Kapurea v. Subhasish Panda]..A special bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan took exception to the felling of the tress and said that two documents placed before the Court showed LG's involvement in the same."What is this? This is such a brazen act. Two documents placed on record clearly say that it was LG," the Court remarked.The Court sought clarity in this regard."We want to know who exactly committed the breach of our order. If nobody responds, we would be inclined to say LG issued directions," the Court said in response.The Court noted that all facts related to the felling were not on record and underlined the necessity of a detailed enquiry."We find that all the facts relating to felling of trees have not come on record. We see that the LG approved the felling of trees. We feel that a detailed enquiry has to be taken place after the notices are being served to the (DDA) officers. We are not going to take this lightly. If the authority (DDA) is not going to conform to protection of environment, this court has to come to rescue and affirm it clearly that environment protection cannot be taken lightly," the Court said.Amidst the hearing, the Court also questioned Senior Advocate Maninder Singh, appearing for DDA, regarding the involvement of the LG."As per this, it is being depicted that it was the Lieutenant Governor (LG) who gave the instructions to you to proceed with the cutting of trees. We need answers as to who exactly issued these directions? More than 1100 trees have been cut, I will not say anything more on this? is the chairman responsible for this? This is an extremely serious issue. That is why we issued contempt," Justice Oka said..The Court was hearing a suo motu contempt of court case against DDA Vice Chairman Subhashish Panda for felling of trees in violation of the Court's orders.Based on a report of the DDA constituted committee to probe the issue, the Court noted that some emails indicated a site visit by the LG on February 3, 2024, following which the LG issued directions to cut the trees. It further observed that the committee had not probed the contents of the email and had entirely blamed three DDA officers. As per the affidavit of the Vice Chairman, the Court noted that there has been a play of shifting of blame being done on the officers stating that they were responsible for direction of felling of the trees and violating the top court's order. Therefore, the Court issued contempt notice to the officers Manoj Kumar Yadav (Executive Engineer), Pawan Kumar (Assistant Engineer), Ayush Saraswat (Assistant Engineer) and Pankaj Verma (Sub Engineer) of DDA to enable a detailed enquiry. In light of the doubts expressed by it, the Court also directed DDA Vice Chairman to file an additional affidavit..Further, the Court also took strong exception to the appointment of judicial officers as legal advisors of the DDA and remarked that this act violated the principle of separation of powers and independence of judiciary."It is clear that the DDA is the major litigant before the Delhi High Court and some of the serving officers are serving as legal advisors to it. We immediately direct our registry to place this order before the Registrar General of Delhi High Court who will then place it before Acting Chief justice to take further action on this. We cannot allow this kind of grave violation," it said.The Court emphasized the necessity for clear regulations under the Delhi Preservation of Trees Act for prohibiting tree felling without Supreme Court permission.The matter will be heard again on June 26..[Read Live Coverage]