The Haryana government launched its green initiative, ‘Oxygen Forests’, in the two districts of Karnal and Panchkula on World Environment Day.Since then, the Karnal district administration has been actively engaged in planting saplings on barren land under a project aptly called ‘Harit Karnal’. The Deputy Commissioner of Karnal, Mr. Nishant Yadav, outlined the plans and objectives of the project to Indian Masterminds.
OVER ONE LAKH TREES PLANTED
Under the ‘Harit Karnal’ project, hundreds of saplings are being planted in the villages of the district. “We recently completed our goal of planting one lakh trees. In fact, we over-achieved by planting around 1.25 lakh trees in all the villages,” Mr. Nishant Yadav said.
He further informed that it was not easy to plant such a huge number of saplings, as places had to first identified for plantation. They included school campuses, community centres, also, in the initial drive. However, later on, they identified panchayat land in eight villages for this purpose, and this made their task easier. “We managed to plant saplings in an area of 5 acres,” he said.
TURNING BARREN LAND GREEN
The officer himself planted 600 saplings on the 5-acres panchayat land of Subhri village.
“By planting around 600 trees, we are endeavoring to create an oxygen forest in this village, which will be maintained through the NREGA scheme. All efforts are being made to ensure that the area comes up like a proper forest in the future,” he remarked.
This plantation drive is a part of the eight oxygen forests planned for the district, the work of which has already commenced in many areas. During the drive, saplings of fruit-bearing and shade-giving trees like Banyan, Peepal, Neem, Jamun, Arjun, Gullar, Arhad and Amla were planted.
MASSIVE PLANTATION DRIVE IN VILLAGES
He also informed that about Rs 13 lakhs have been especially earmarked for this work. Earlier, an amount of Rs 36,57000was spent on levelling the land to make it ready for plantation.
He also said that plantation work is going on in numerous villages under the ‘Jal Shakti Abhiyan’ scheme, also. Senior government officials like the Additional Deputy Commissioner,Mr. Yogesh Kumar, the SDM and Nodal Officer of Plantation Program,Mr. Gaurav Kumar, the District Development and Panchayat Officer,Mr. Rajbir Khundia,along with social workers and local villagers have been actively taking part in such plantation drives.
The Deputy Commissioner hopes to create awareness among the local youth about the need to plant more trees, so that they also participate in the plantation drive, to make the Oxygen Forest Project a big success.
