Navi Mumbai: Activists bat for Central hill regulation authority

Raising concerns over the alarming situation at Joshimath in Uttarakhand environmentalists have called for setting up a Central hill regulation authority Navi Mumbaibased NGO NatConnect Foundationmdashin a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi President Droupadi Murmu Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and the ministry of environment forest and climate change MOEFampCCmdashdrew attention to incidents of landslides in Mumbai and elsewhere which it termed naturersquos warnings against playing with hills and slopesThe letter stated that the Joshimath episode was the tip of the iceberg as the rampant destruction of hills in the name of development in various parts of the country including the Northeast and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands could lead to many more Himalayanscale disasters NatConnect Foundation pointed out that nobody seems to have ownership over the hillsldquoThe forest department allows diversionndashmeaning destructionndashfor infrastructure or housing projects the revenue department is concerned with the collection of royalties from hill digging or quarrying and the environment department merely passes the buck There is a tendency to run down environmental concerns as antidevelopmentrdquo the letter written by NatConnect Foundation director B N Kumar readAlso Read After Joshimath cracks appear in houses in Uttarakhands Karnprayag people seek govt helpThe NGO requested the authorities to look at the impact of infrastructure projects on nature and lives ldquoCity planners such as CIDCO have allotted 200 plots at Parsik Hill for development and planned a township in the Kharghar Hills in Navi Mumbai Despite opposition from the Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation NMMC and the people in general CIDCO is keen on reviving quarrying at Parsik Hillsrdquo the letter readActivist Jyoti Nadkarni told midday ldquoThe idea of a nature park at Parsik that was developed in association with Bombay Natural History Society seems to have been given a gobyrdquo Nareshchandra Singh another activist said ldquoCIDCO said the township would have access to the nature park How on earth can anyone have a massive residential colony touching a nature park and play with biodiversityrdquoCiting a recent experience Kumar alleged the chief minister had sent a series of complaints regarding the cutting of slopes of Parsik and Kharghar Hills to the forest and environment departments But none of these authorities showed any inclination to take action ldquoParsik Hill saw a landslide during the last monsoon and the Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporationrsquos water supply monitoring station escaped a major disasterrdquo he addedldquoThis might look like a small incident for the planning agencies and authorities but they are playing with the lives of peoplerdquo said Vishnu Joshi convenor Parsik Hill Greens forum ldquoWe wonder how it does not strike government officials that the cutting of the Parsik Hill slope which has hundreds of buildings on top of it would endanger the homes and the peoplerdquo he addedldquoThanks to the intervention of the Human Rights Commission we can now expect justicerdquo Parsik Hill Residents Association President Jayant Thakur said The HRC is slated to have its final hearing on the matter on Thursday Nandakumar Pawar the head of Ekvira Aai Pratishthan said despite the recurring landslides at hills in Mumbai the authorities have not checked mushrooming slum colonies ldquoOur ministers and officials seem to be interested only in lip service at the time of disasters and forget about the tragedies laterrdquo Pawar saidKumar and Pawar also pointed out that upcoming highway projects through hills in the state could also prove to be dangerous The activists also claimed that no meaningful public hearings were held or any environmental impact assessment carried out beforehand They stated that this was why it was essential that a hill regulation authority be set up with powers and duties to check the destruction of hills200No of plots allotted at Parsik Hill