COIMBATORE: At a time when there is growing concern over the decreasing forest cover in the country, Tamil Nadu has been adding new forest areas, although in small measures.In recent months, the State has been declaring new areas as Reserved Forest under the Tamil Nadu Forest Act, 1882. Last month, through a GO, over 1,000 of acres land was included in the forest area in western Tamil Nadu.“ Around 1,054.13 acres of land in Panaikulam Forest Block in Pennagaram Taluk in Dharmapuri district and 5.72 acres of land in Sekkarapatti Forest Block II in Salem district’s Omalur Taluk were included as Reserved Forest.Besides, 0.988 acre of land in The Nilgiris was classified as forest land,” a State Environmental Ministry official said.However, K Mohan Raj, coordinator, Tamil Nadu Green Movement (Coimbatore Chapter), dubbed the move as something that came too late and was too less. “This (adding new areas) looks like a selective notification without any proper preamble. There are too many loose ends to be tied.Two roads in Reserve Forests - Mettukottai to Malaiyar and Thirumalvadi to Pikkiliperiyur - were denotified recently with the mud road being wider inside the forest. We are losing our forest cover,” he argued.When contacted, C V Sankar, Principal Secretary to Government (Environment and Forests) countered the charge that the State was slow in expanding its green cover. “Tamil Nadu has added 267 sq km to its forest cover according to the India State of Forest Report 2011. Moreover, our State gets the least from the compensatio n fund for deforestation - this reflects on the low scale of diversions in the State,” he said.Raising a different point, Tamil Nadu Green Movement joint secretary S Jayachandran said that the government had failed to clear encroachments on forest land.“In our State, most of the forest land is encroached upon. These encroachments have to be cleared first. We cannot determine the actual addition or loss of green cover unless the forest area is resurveyed throughout the country. It takes a long time to cultivate a forest and barely minutes to destroy it,” he said.
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