Don’t oppose cutting of trees, Mumbai Metro should have been built 30 years ago: HC

To those opposing the Mumbai metro III project over potential destruction of green cover, the Bombay High Court advised on Thursday, to take a “pragmatic view.”

A bench of Justices VM Kanade and AM Badar said that the Metro was “important” considering the worsening traffic situation in the city.

Justice Kanade said that the city should have developed a metro network “30 years ago.”

“These public utility projects should have been operational in the city decades ago and still, people were opposing them, causing further delay.”

The court said that thousands of people travelled between north and south Mumbai each day, and several others die in road accidents. The Metro III project will prove immensely useful for these people and thus, those opposing the project must “first consider the ground situation.”

HC was hearing an application filed by MMRC seeking the court’s nod to clear 108 mangroves for the creation of the proposed Bandra-Kurla Complex metro station.

It said that it had all permissions from the MoEF but that since the BKC and Dharavi stations fell in the Coastal Regulatory Zone area, it needed the court’s leave.

MMRC said it will replant 4000 mangroves to compensate for the 108 mangroves it was going to destroy.