PMC officials said that in the last two years, particularly when roads were being developed for the Commonwealth Youth Games, widening of at least 12 major roads was taken up

A day after the Bombay high court (HC) refused permission to the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) to cut trees for road widening until three times the number of trees are planted, the garden department has pulled up its socks.

Department officials are taking stock of the number of trees that have been felled for major road widening works in the last few years. Reminder letters have also been sent to the road department, asking it to provide plots for the planting of saplings wherever trees have been axed.

Speaking to TOI, PMC's assistant garden superintendent Ashok Ghorpade, however, insisted that it was a routine procedure followed by the department. "In some cases, plots were not provided to the garden department to plant saplings. The plots are to be identified by the road department. It is for such cases that we issue reminder notices," Ghorpade said.

Sources in the department, however, admitted that the action had been prompted by the Bombay high court's directive. "Following the HC order on Wednesday saying that trees should be cut only after planting of three saplings in exchange, we are making sure that the rule is followed in the past cases as well so that the PMC's record on this front is clean," an official said.

Source: Times Of India Provide land to plant trees, road dept told