Goemkarponn desk
PANAJI: Supreme Court has upheld the revised criteria laid down by the Government of Goa in 2005 with reference to delimitation of private forest areas.
According to advocate general Devidas Pangam, the state government uses two criteria to identify private forests: first, the area must be adjacent to government forest lands; second, if the area is isolated, it must be at least five hectares in size.
A canopy density of no less than 0.4 is acceptable. The third requirement is that forestry species account for 75% of the trees on such lands.
The Goa Foundation contested these requirements, arguing that regions measuring one hectare and possessing a minimum canopy density of 0.1 ought to be eligible for designation as private forests.
The National Green Tribunal (NGT), which the Goa Foundation had previously approached, had likewise supported the standards set by the state government.
The Goa Foundation then filed an appeal with the Supreme Court. According to Claude Alvares of the Goa Foundation, the organization has been able to stop operations in about 500 hectares of land covered in trees by virtue of the stay on activities in areas designated as private forests for the length of the legal proceedings.
One of the parties to the NGT case, CREDAI-GOA, expressed gratitude to the Supreme Court for upholding the NGT’s order in the same case and for accepting the Goan government’s methodology and standards for identifying private forests.
Additionally, this has lifted the moratorium on granting conversion sanads for properties larger than one hectare and with a canopy density higher than 0.1.
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