On Thursday, the Delhi High Court issued a directive stating that authorities in the national capital are prohibited from granting permission to cut down trees for house construction.

Further, the Court affirmed that its order from August 31, in which the Delhi government declared a halt to granting tree-felling permissions for individuals and specified that any necessary permissions for crucial projects would be reported to the court until the next hearing date, remains in effect.

The bench headed by Justice Jasmeet Singh granted two weeks' time to Anupam Srivastava, the Delhi government's additional standing counsel, to file a detailed report on the status of transplanted and replanted trees in the city.

"In the meantime, the directions contained in the August 31 order shall continue. No permission shall be granted for felling of trees in respect of construction of houses," the Court said.

Case Brief -

The High Court was hearing a petition seeking contempt action against the officers who, despite clear directions of the court in an April 2022 order that required them to "spell out the reasons for felling of even a single tree", were not complying with it.

Adv Aditya N Prasad, counsel for Petitioner filed an application seeking early hearing of the contempt plea, stating that despite the April 2022 order, the authorities were "recklessly granting permission for felling of trees".

Upon reviewing the permissions issued by the officers for tree removal within the city, the high court noted on August 31 that-

"A perusal of the permissions granted by the respondent for felling of trees seems to suggest that there is total non-application of mind while granting permissions. Some of the permissions show that trees have been permitted to be cut for individuals requiring parking spaces for their vehicles".

Earlier, the petitioner's counsel had previously presented that they had identified 57 instances where tree officers had issued orders granting tree felling or transplantation permissions solely because the trees were located within the proposed construction project's alignment.

The next date of hearing is on October 6.

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