SC sets Oct 22 deadline for LG Saxena to act on ridge tree felling, seeks answers

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday set a deadline of October 22 for Delhi lieutenant governor Vinai Kumar Saxena to act against officials of the Delhi Development Authority (DDA), in his capacity as its chairperson, for illegally felling over 1,100 trees in Delhi’s southern ridge and sought an affidavit from him in that capacity to answer key questions related to why the trees were felled without mandatory clearance from the court.
The order was passed by a bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud while considering a contempt petition against the DDA vice chairman. The case concerns DDA clearing trees in the ridge near Satbari in February for a road construction project, and conveniently failing to disclose this to the court which dismissed DDA’s application seeking permission for the felling of trees (that had already been felled) on March 4.
Without issuing notice to the LG, the bench, also comprising justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, asked Saxena to file a personal affidavit in his capacity as DDA chairman answering certain critical questions in the chain of facts that have remained ambiguous. These relate to a site visit he made on February 3 following which the tree cutting began on or around February 16 and continued till February 26. The bench asked the LG to clarify whether he discussed anything about the permission to be obtained for the felling of the trees and whether he was at all aware that such permission was needed.
If he did not know that the top court’s permission was needed, the court wished to know, when he became aware of this requirement; and when he was told about the actual felling of trees having commenced before moving the application for permission in court. The court also wanted to know whether Saxena took any remedial steps to restore the ecological damage caused by the felling of trees (without permission) and action, if any, against the officers responsible.
The CJI-led bench said, “The Chairman DDA shall take steps to fix responsibility of acts of commission and omission of the officers involved… If DDA chairman is of the view that such disciplinary action and initiation of criminal action for breaching directions of this court has to be taken up, we would expect such action be taken in the interregnum without awaiting this court’s order.”
Although notice was issued on the contempt petition by a bench headed by justice Abhay S Oka in May this year, the matter was referred to the CJI as another bench of the top court headed by justice Bhushan R Gavai was dealing with the same aspect of contempt against DDA and had sought response of DDA vice chairman in April .
Senior advocates Mahesh Jethmalani and Maninder Singh appearing for chairman and vice chairman of DDA said that most of the information has already been supplied in the various affidavits filed by DDA vice chairman during the proceedings before a bench led by justice Oka.
Jethmalani said, “The question to be asked is whether it was caused because of me (the LG).” He submitted that the LG went to visit the CAPFIMS hospital – a multi-speciality hospital in the vicinity – on February 3 and stopped by to see the status of the road construction. “He was not the final authority in this matter as other authorities had already granted permission (for the felling),” he contended.
To which the CJI responded: “You mean to say all of this was done by subordinates? We now want the highest authority to satisfy us. Before we take action, we want action to be taken by DDA.”
The court indicated that the personal affidavit by the LG should be based on the records and facts available in his personal knowledge, considering the site visit on February 3. Soon after this visit where he gave orders to expedite work, the DDA obtained permission from the Delhi government on February 14 for felling 422 trees, although many more trees were chopped.
DDA, on its part, following an in-house enquiry, fixed the blame on three officers – executive engineer Manoj Kumar Yadav and two subordinate officers Pawan Kumar and Ayush Saraswat – for permitting the felling of trees. But the court termed them “scapegoats” as the emails written by Manoj Kumar Yadav on February 7 and 14 showed that the LG visited the site in question on February 3 and “directed to clear the trees coming in the right of way”. During the enquiry, Yadav denied the emails were from his email ID.
Appearing for the contempt petitioners, senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan along with advocate Manan Verma took the court through the history of the case pertaining to Delhi ridge where orders were issued from time to time in the TN Godavarman matter pertaining to forest land by justice Gavai-led bench and in the MC Mehta case pertaining to green cover in Delhi (which is being heard by the other bench headed by justice Oka).