The Madras High Court has upheld the extension of Preservation of Private Forest Act, 1949, to Kanyakumari District and subsequent declaration of certain lands to be forest.
Dismissing a batch of appeals and petitions, a division bench, comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice T S Sivagnanam, said "we find no grounds to interfere with the order passed by the single judge."
The judge had in 2002 upheld the Act and notifications, issued in July, 1980, which have been challenged in the present appeals and writ petitions.
The Act was enacted to prevent indiscriminate destruction of private forest including waste or communal land containing trees, shrubs and reeds, pasture land and any other class of land declared by the state government to be a forest.
Petitioners and appelants contended that the lands, being patta lands, cannot be declared as forest that too when they are rubber plantations which are manmade and not spontaneous and used in agricultural operations.
They also aruged that the District Collector was not empowered to notify the lands as private forest.
Rejecting both the grounds, the HC bench said the Act was extended to Kanyakumari district after it was brought to the notice of the government that there was indiscriminate destruction of private forest.
"Therefore, the contention of the appellants and the Rubber Board that there is a conclusive finding that there is no private forest in Kanyakumari district is a misconceived plea," the court said.
Also, the government, taking into consideration the representation of the rubber plantation owners, had issued a G.O. In April, 1984 by which permission can be granted by the District Forest Officer for felling matured rubber trees.
None of the plantations owners have experienced any difficulties in this regard. "Therefore, the single judge was right in holding that the contention that there has been violation of principles of natural justice is unacceptable," the bench said.
