Haryana: Shamli-Ambala corridor to see felling of 60,000 trees

SHAMLI : Over 60,000 trees will be felled for construction of the 121-km-long, Rs 3,663crore Shamli-Ambala economic corridor that will connect Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh.
Thirty villages in Saharanpur and 12 villages in Shamli will have to part with land for the six-lane greenfield project, proposed under the Bharatmala Pariyojana. The acquisition process will begin shortly.The scale of felling has led to many raising concerns about its environmental impact. "A public hearing for environmental clearance of this project has been done. We'll try to plant five times the number of trees felled to compensate for the loss. The construction company will plant double the number of trees and some will also be planted at the village and ad- ministrative levels," said ADM Santosh Kumar Singh, nodal officer of the project in Shamli.
Gaurav Bansal, an environmentalist and lawyer, said, "Development is necessary but it must be sustainable. These trees can be saved by translocating them. There should be a budgetary allocation for the purpose and a strict policy for these things. "
The corridor will connect Ambala, Kurukshetra, Karnal and Yamunanagar cities with the Saharanpur and Shamli districts of West UP. The project’s right of way is roughly 60 metres.