GURGAON: National Green Tribunal (NGT) has slam med Haryana forest depart-ment over gaps in its compli ance report in the tree-felling case, calling it “materially de-ficient” and directing the di-visional forest officer (DFO) to appear at next hearing.In its April 27 order, the principal bench said, “We ha ve gone through the status re-port dated April 24 filed by DFO, Gurgaon and found the same to be materially deficient, as the area of compensa tory plantation and survival rate of the saplings planted have not been mentioned.” The matter was heard by Jus tices Arun Kumar Tyagi and Sudhir Agarwal, along with expert member A Senthil Vel.The complainant alleged illegal and large-scale tree felling in Gurgaon’s urban areas. On Nov 6, 2025, the tri bunal had sought an affidavit detailing the number of tree felling permissions granted in the city over a one-year pe riod, the number of trees fel-led under those permissions, the saplings planted as part of compliance conditions, and their survival rate.Observing that these cru cial details were still missing, the bench stressed the need for technology-based accoun tability “With advances in technology, all compensatory plantations can be geo-tag gedand video-recorded. Each planted sapling can be assig ned a unique number, its sur-vival rate can be tracked, and the plantation area can be properly recorded,” the bench said. It also observed that “further care and maintenance of the saplings planted has to be monitored by evolving appro-priate mechanism and re ports have to be filed as well.““The order signals shar-per scrutiny of whether com-pensatory plantation condi-tions attached to tree-felling permissions in Gurgaon are being implemented on the ground or remain confined to paperwork, with the tribunal now pushing for verifiable, geotagged monitoring of plantation compliance,” said environmentalist Vaishali Rana, who filed the petition.
