Lie #2: Out of the 1287 hectares, the metro car shed will be only built on 30 Ha which is just 2.5% of Aarey. There is no need to worry, this is only a small amount of loss of 0.6% to Mumbai.
The Fact:
1. MMRC has asked 65 Ha not 30 Ha of Aarey from Environmental Ministry as falsely claimed in the advertisements. Please click on the link to see the documents:
https://www.facebook.com/734792891/posts/10158806819437892/
2. MMRC doesn't stop with building a car shed, there are several development projects waiting to usurp the forest once the car shed makes an entry. 36Ha for slum rehabilitation project, 177Ha for film city, 1.6Ha for RTO, 2Ha for metro bhavan, 97.12Ha for zoo. Total 346.72Ha of Aarey going for development projects.
3. There is barely any loss to the environment if we loose 0.6% of a forest land.
Breaking of a large, contiguous forested areas into smaller forest patches, separated by roads, agriculture, utility corridors or other anthropological developments termed as Forest Fragmentation is fatal to the forest ecosystem. Fragmentation directly affects ecological and behavioural factors such as foraging movements, dispersal, migrations and colonization abilities of animal species. Fragmentation disrupts demographic functioning and genetic make up of populations, and drastically reduces long-term population viability in plants and animals. This is particularly true for extinction-prone species which are found in Aarey.
https://northernwoodlands.org/articles/article/forest-fragmentation
Besides, the threat to the biodiversity, there is a socio-economic loss to human population:
A. Loss of clean air
Ideal tree: human ratio is 7-8 trees per person. In Mumbai we have 1 tree between 4 persons. When this dangerous ratio requires an urgent increase in green cover losing 2702 trees is unaffordable.
B. Socio-economic loss
The ‘socio-economic’ value of a tree is Rs 23.72 lakh a year, accordingly loosing 2702 trees would mean losing a staggering Rs. 642 crore loss a year. If we go by the average that a healthy tree can provide oxygen for 30 years, the loss would escalate to Rs 22,000 crore.
C. Loss of civilizations and cultures
The project affects over 27 tribal hamlets & is likely to directly affect over 2,000 indigenous tribal families that have been living here since generations.
D. Loss of Mithi river floodplain
Metro 3 Car Shed site at Aarey is floodplains of the Mithi River. Concretisation of floodplains by building car shed will increase the chances of flooding in already flood-prone Mumbai.
E. Loss of biological corridor for wildlife
There have been several incidents of leopards spotting reported in the area where the metro car shed is proposed. This area acts as biological corridor for the wildlife that aarey forest is nurturing.
We request the authorities to stop exploiting the use of data to justify the destruction of invaluable complex forest system gifted to the city of Mumbai.