Over 50 environmental activists and organisations have demanded a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) into the illegal felling of reserved trees at Muttil in Wayanad and from assigned lands elsewhere in the State.
They submitted a joint statement to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan with copies to Revenue Minister K. Rajan, Forest Minister A.K. Saseendran, Chief Secretary V.P. Joy and other senior bureaucrats.
Pinpointing the Revenue Department’s circular and the controversial order that were issued on March 11 and October 24 last as responsible for the alleged crime, the petitioners found fault in the government’s stance that there was no need to investigate the circumstances under which the orders had been issued.
Claiming that the position was a challenge to the judicial system, the accused the then Revenue and Forest Ministers as well as the officials in their offices of being responsible for the illegal orders that paved way for the mass felling of the protected trees.
They were sceptical of the ongoing investigation that is underway against the backdrop of the Chief Minister dismissing the possibility of any oversight while issuing the contentious orders.
The environmentalists were also critical of the government’s purported stance that such actions were taken in the best interests of farmers and tribespeople. They demanded amendments to the laws to bestow farmers the right to cut trees legally from their assigned lands.
The signatories include former Kerala State Biodiversity Board chairman V.S. Vijayan, environmentalists N. Badusha, Sridhar Radhakrishnan, Kusumam Joseph, T.P. Padmanabhan, Sobheendran, Harish Vasudevan and John Peruvanthanam, S. Babuji, S. Usha and J. Devika.
