Narendra Modi to start Tree Plantation Drive on World Environment Day: Javadekar

Sportspersons to join Environment Ministry’s efforts to plant trees across the country.

The Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi will start a tree plantation campaign by planting a sapling at his official residence, 7 RCR on June 5, to mark the World Environment Day. Addressing the media here today ahead of the World Environment Day, Minister of State of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Shri Prakash Javadekar said that the captain of the Indian Cricket team, Virat Kohli and international wrestler, Sushil Kumar will participate in a function to plant saplings at Parvayvaran Bhawan. The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change is celebrating the World Environment Day on June 5, 2015 by planting saplings across the country.

On the evening of June 5, cricketers Sachin Tendulkar, Ajinkya Rane and Rohit Sharma, along with Shri Prakash Javadekar and Maharashtra Minister for primary, higher and technical & Medical education and Culture Shri Vinod Tawde and others will plant saplings in Mumbai at Joggers Park on Carter Road.

Cricketers Yusuf Pathan and Irfan Pathan will join Ministers and other local leaders in planting saplings in Vadodara. In Indore, Narendra Hirwani, Sanjay Jagdale and Gopal Sharma will join Madhya Pradesh’s Urban Administration, Housing and Environment Minister Shri Kailash Vijayvargiya and other local leaders in the plantation campaign.

The Indian Cricket team, along with BCCI Secretary Anurag Thakur, will participate in a plantation drive in Kolkata on June 6. The Indian Cricket team will later leave for Bangladesh to play a Test match and One Day Internationals. Renowned boxers Mary Kom and Sarita Devi, billiards player Geet Sethi and hockey player Viren Rasquinha have also pledged their support to the campaign and will also plant saplings wherever they are on June 5.

Shri Javadekar also said that to achieve the goal of more green, a new pilot project on Urban Forestry will be launched in Pune on June 6. Seventy acres of forest land in Pune is being compounded and about 4, 000 trees will be planted on it. This project will be run through public participation in the form of a Memorial Garden. People will pay Rs 2, 000 per tree and that tree will be named after their beloved ones. The Minister emphasised that extensive public participation is a must for the success of such initiatives. He added that on World Environment Day, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change reiterates its pledge to work for Clean Air, Clean Water, Clean Energy, Clean Environment and more Green.

The Ministry has written to all Chief Ministers and Corporations to identify forest lands in urban areas, particularly in cities to develop forest. Most of the cities do have some gardens, but do not have forests. Shri Javadekar underlined the fact that if forests can be developed, particularly with native fruit bearing and other trees in urban areas, they will work as a carbon sink. This project has been named Nagar Van-udyan Yojana”” (Urban Forest Plan) and will be financed partly from Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) CAMPA funds. It will develop forests within urban areas in the years to come.

The Minister also highlighted that the Ministry has already piloted a bill in Parliament to release nearly Rs 35, 000 crore under CAMPA to all the states, so that they can make more efforts for greening degraded forest areas, adopt best wildlife management practices, change the quality of the existing forests, to convert moderate forest to dense forest and many such forest activities. This will help in achieving the Green India Mission in a record time and it will also boost employment, particularly in the rural and tribal areas.