Panel To Oversee Implementation Of Supreme Court Order On Forests
The Supreme Court has finalised a plan to set up a committee to oversee the problems arising from the judgment passed in December that banned felling of trees in the North-East. The judgment had also stopped all non-forest activities, especially mining, in the forests all over the country.
As many as 15 states have moved the Supreme Court for modifications, stating that they have complied with the order in varying degrees. Apart from the state governments, there are nearly a hundred applications from miners, timber merchants, plywood and vinyl traders and saw mills.
A division bench consisting of Justice J S Verma and Justice B N Kirpal, who passed the original judgment in December, has been hearing the parties for the last three days.
After lengthy debates, the court finalised a draft order which will be passed on Tuesday. Senior counsel Harish Salve was assisting the court in the matter as amicus curiae (friend of the court) and attorney general Ashok Desai has put forward the views of the Union government.
The committee will be headed by former Arunachal Pradesh Governor T V Rajeshwara Rao. Rajeshwara Rao was present in the court to hear the problems he will have to deal with in the next two months.
He has to report to the court at the end of the two months.
The committee will include a representative of the Union ministry of environment & forests and former IG of forests R N Kaul. Rajeshwara Rao may co-opt experts and representatives of the seven north-eastern states.
The committee, to be financed initially by the Union government, will oversee the preparation of inventories of the timber lying in the forests at the time the court stopped the felling of trees. It has been asked to determine the origin of the timber.
According to the draft proposals, the committee may allow the use or sale of timber and its products through the respective state forest corporations. Such permission will be only to implement previous contracts.
The sale proceeds will be deposited by the corporations in designated accounts after deducting the transaction costs and the payment of wages to the staff and workers. The modalities for this will be left to the Rajeshwara Rao committee.