Gujarat Enviornment and Forest minister Shri Mangubhai Patel today clearly indicated state government’s intention to amend the Saurashtra Vruksha Chhedan Act – 1951.

Speaking at national seminar on Social Forestry the minister said: At present one can cut tree after getting Mamlatdar’s permission, but state government want to bring an amendment which would make it mandatory to plant at least ten trees to get permission to cut one tree.

The minister asked the officials of his department to start working in this direction. He said the amendment will be passed in Gujarat Assembly in future.

The minister expressed concern over lacking of care for plants once they are planted during Van Mahotsav.

“We celebrate Van Mahotsav every year, but after the functions are over, plants are not taken care of well. We plant 10 crore plants every year, but after few months only 1 crore plants survive. If we follow the figures ideally there should be addition of total 100 crore trees in last 10 years,” he said.

“I myself saw on Himmatnagar highway that 21 km rod side plantation was secured by 5,000 tree guards. However when I personally assessed, only 1,000 tree guards had tree surviving inside, and rest of tree guards were empty because plants were dead due to lacking of proper care,” the minister added.

Giving example of Social forestry, Principal Secretary Shri S.K.Nanda said that Gujarat’s Anand district has no forest area, but it earns about Rs. 140 crore from trees. This district has 68.4 trees per hector. It is ‘Timber surplus’ district.