Disbursement for green schemes fall after Jayanthi takes over

Notwithstanding warnings by a government body, Environment Ministry's disbursement for forest generation programmes has drastically come down since Jayanthi Natarajan took over.
The ministry released only Rs 193.13 crore to the states in last financial year under the ambitious centrally-sponsored scheme National Afforestation Programme (NAP) for generating forests.
It is over Rs 100 crore less than the Ministry's financial release to the states previous year.
According to an official document, the ministry, in 2011-12, had released Rs 303 crore to the states for increasing tree cover.
Jairam Ramesh was the Environment Minister before Natarajan took over in July, 2011.
During Ramesh's stint in the Ministry in 2009-10 and 2010-11, the Ministry had disbursed Rs 318 crore and Rs 309.99 crore respectively to the states for forest generation under the NAF-- a 100 per cent centrally-sponsored programme.

The document also reveals that the Ministry released only Rs 51.06 crore to the states in 2012-13 under the forest protection programme called Intensification of Forest Management Scheme (IFMS). It is Rs 9 crore less than previous year's release.

In 2011-12, the Ministry had released Rs 60.72 crore to the states.
The revelation comes amid concerns that the rapid decrease in the forest areas are posing serious danger to the country's environment.
According to India State of Forest Report-2011, released by the Forest Survey of India, India has lost 367 sq km of forest cover.