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Synopsis

The Supreme Court on Friday, refused to entertain a plea argued by Senior Lawyer Indira Jaising in the ongoing Aarey Tree felling issue. She informed the court that she was appearing for some affected forest dwellers.

A bench of CJI DY Chandrachud & PS Narasimha stated that issues such as this cannot be brought to the top court and the petitioner should have approached the respective high courts instead.

Jaising told court that the forest dwellers sought to intervene in the ongoing case here, “We seek to intervene. I appear for the tribals... 49 trees are on our land. They never informed the court that the trees which will be cut will be from Adivasi land. Mumbai metro should have brought this to the knowledge of court"

The bench, however, did not consider it appropriate to entertain the plea and instead said that since the case is already pending before Bombay High Court, the petitioners should approach the HC.

"Ms Indira Jaising, senior counsel appearing on behalf of the applicant, submits that the applicant seeks to claim rights as forest dwellers.Since the High Court is seized of the matter, it would be appropriate to grant liberty to the applicant to move the High Court to pursue his remedies," said the order.

On the last date, while imposing a cost of INR 10 lacs on Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Limited's (MMRCL) for removing an excess of 84 trees, in contravention of an earlier order of the top court, Supreme Court had allowed the authority to also remove 177 more so that the public project does not come to a standstill.

A bench comprising Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justices P S Narasimha and J B Pardiwala had said that the authority had indulged in an overreach.

The Court was hearing application seeking permission to cut additional trees of the Aarey Forest in a suo-moto cognizance case, in which the court had acted on a letter written by a law student, Rishav Ranjan, to the then Chief Justice of India, seeking a stay on the cutting of trees for the Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Limited's car shed located on 33 hectares land in Mumbai’s Aarey Colony.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta had recently submitted before the Supreme Court that the petitioner before it, opposing the said application should be asked to compensate the public exchequer for the delay caused to the government's projects.

The letter written by the law student had stated, "The site is on the bank of the Mithi River, with several channels and tributaries flowing into it, and construction for the 'polluting industry' could flood Mumbai". The court had accepted the letter as Public Interest Litigation (PIL) and set up the special Bench.

The Supreme Court in 2019, had directed the State of Maharashtra not to cut any further trees in Aarey and to maintain the status quo. Court had however clarified that there it had not stayed the construction of the metro car shed project, and the status quo pertained only to the further felling of trees.

Case Title: IN RE FELLING OF TREES IN AAREY FOREST