Does the same logic hold good for BBMP felling trees in GKVK campus?
No. BBMP never consulted the residents before deciding to fell trees in the GKVK campus. More than 3,000 trees were to be felled and there was no public consultation. But in case of metro rail, the project has gone through a legitimate process of environmental impact study and public hearing. If there was a public hearing, how come the protestors are on the streets? The government had invited everyone, especially the activists to the public hearing but few turned up. Those who turned up did not raise objections then. Now suddenly they have woken up and are protesting. Every engineering project has environmental cost. But there seems to be a problem in balancing development with environmental impact. Why is it so? It is not very difficult. In Jnanabharati campus of Bangalore University, we have replicated bio-diversity of Western Ghats by planting 3.5 lakh trees since 2001. It has fixed 27,000 tonnes of carbon so far. Trees can be planted and transplanted. We should remember that like p
