Chandrasekhar Rao launches 'Haritha Haram' drive to increase forest cover
Hyderabad: Saying that the drought in Telangana State is man-made due to wanton destruction of forests, Chief Minister Chandrasekhar Rao on Friday asserted that restoration of ecological balance was the only solution to this problem as also to improve the lives of the people. KCR launched the two-week-long state-wide Haritha Haram project to plant saplings at Gundrampalli in Chityal mandal of Nalgonda district. He also opened a new marketyard in Choutuppal.
“Power cuts are gone. Mission Bhagiratha bri-ngs water and Mission Kakatiya revives tanks. If there is greenery, there will be rain and no drought. In just three minutes, I sanctioned Rs 350 crore for canals. But can we buy rain with this amount, KCR asked, and blamed people for monkeys swarming villages and towns in search of food and water, as their habitats were being demolished. People complain of monkey menace and ask the government to catch them. We don’t harm or kill monkeys since it’s Anjanna... Lord Anjaneyaswamy. It is our fault and not of monkeys. We encroached onto forests and deprived them of their food habitat and fruit-bearing trees. Yadagirigutta once used to be full of monkeys,”he noted.
Turning poetic, he said, “Vanalu vapas ravale, Kothulu vapas povale. Prathi patashala.. prathi badi oka akupachha vadi kavali (Rains should return and monkeys should go back to their habitats; every school should be green).”
The Haritha Haram project envisaged planting of a total of 46 crore saplings, 25 lakh of them in Hyderabad, this season. This also includes planting of 1.25 lakh saplings by one lakh people on the 163km-long national highway in Telangana area between Hyderabad and Vijayawada. A similar programme is taken up on Hyderabad - Mumbai, and Bengaluru -Nagpur highways.
Stating that he chose Nalgonda to launch the Haritha Haram programme as it has least forest area — just 5.8 per cent of the state’s forest area of 24 per cent, KCR said none will come from United States or Russia to raise greenery in Nalgonda but the people here have to take up the mammoth yagnam. Right from being a student in school, one has to do this, he said.
Asking everyone to ensure 100 per cent survival of the planted saplings, he said he wanted to see Nalgonda standing No 1 in the state in social forestry and greenery. The CM reminded that wherever there were thick forests in state, tanks, rivulets were overflowing.
