A division bench of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, on Saturday, refused to order an interim stay on felling in the DLF project in Gurugram.
“There is no question of any stay. We will take it up next week,” the Bench of Chief Justice Sheel Nagu and Justice Sanjiv Berry said. They said it was prima facie clear on record that DLF had “legitimate” permission. “Now, if you insist, I can reject your interim prayer,” the Chief Justice said.
The Bench, however, directed DLF to place before the court the licence granted for developing the project. “After hearing the counsel for the parties... this court is of the considered view that the relevant licence granted in the favour of respondent-DLF by Haryana Town and Country Planning sometime in 1995-96 is required to be produced. Therefore, DLF is directed to produce the licences for the area in question in regard to which the permission for felling of trees has been granted,” it said.
The Bench said the forest department had given respondent-DLF permissions. “Now, either you challenge those permissions, which appear to be prime facie lawful… If you get a favourable order from the higher court, well and good, otherwise (you have to see) the next remedy against permission to fell trees. There must be an appeal or something.”
A counsel appearing for one of the applicants seeking intervention submitted earlier during the course of hearing that a “designated place” on the government land in the area earmarked for a school had been converted into a stockyard for the builder for keeping construction material.
Seeking ad-interim stay, retired professor-cum-advocate Amita Singh claimed 40,000 trees had been removed. “They have already cleared off 50 acres and now hardly 40 acres is left. You need to give an ad-interim stay. Kindly appoint an amicus and a local commissioner so that we proceed little more legitimately. It's a fight between a David and a Goliath. You have to take consideration to the fact that they are very powerful people and in nexus they are more powerful,” said Amita.
The forest department replied that the permission granted was conditional and not absolute. “Permission has been granted for felling of 2,788 trees, of which 1,623 are ‘kikar’ trees. Further, DLF has been asked to transplant 79 trees after taking into consideration their species, age, other factors, which primarily includes peepal and banyan trees,” it said.
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