Complaint against land mafia trying to destroy Aravallis at Darbaripur registered

Gurugram: There seems to be no end to reports of land mafia encroaching and destroying the Aravallis in and around Gurugram.

In the latest case, a complaint has been registered about the land mafia encroaching and destroying the Aravalli hillocks at Darbaripur. Darbaripur is located at the South Peripheral Road (SPR) and provides a profitable real estate proposition for the builders and the land mafia. There are reports that damage to over 20 acres of Aravallis around the area has already been done.

Despite the reports of hillocks being destroyed by the heavy vehicles and JCB's, surprisingly the officials were not aware of the incident until the villagers reported the matter to the officials. The lack of action by the officials in the past has resulted in massive encroachment to the extent of the offenders developing large acres of farmhouses and banquet halls. Allegations of corruption have often been levelled against the officials for not protecting the greenbelt of Aravallis.

The recent case of land mafia destroying the Darbaripur Aravallis comes after similar reports of forest destruction at Mangar, Kot, and Ghata. Just like Darbaripur, all these areas are located in the zones where there is increased real estate development being undertaken by the builders. Despite several complaints, Aravallis in and around Gurugram continue to bear the brunt of illegal mining, encroachment, diminishing green cover in Gurugram and Faridabad belt.

Only four per cent of the area of Aravallis in Gurugram is notified as a forest. The Punjab Land Conservation Act allows twenty-five per cent of the green cover of Aravallis to be defined as forest area depending upon how dense the vegetation is. "Time and again the land mafia uses the same tactic of illegally acquiring the land by first creating slums or religious structures and from thereon begin the illegal expansion. It is unfortunate that the government officials know the entire sequence of events but do not take the required action," said SS Oberoi, the city environmentalist.