NEW DELHI: Weeks after "Trees for Delhi'', a forum of concerned citizens and civil society organisations, highlighted the issue of ongoing destruction of thousands of trees in the Capital, Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit has invited the group for a discussion on Tuesday.

The meeting at the Chief Minister's office comes against the backdrop of growing public concern at the destruction of trees in the name of traffic de-congestion.

The team will discuss with Ms. Dikshit its demands including immediate end to felling of trees in the name of development, putting in place consultation mechanisms, making full disclosure of the trees cut over the past three years, having clear guidelines for leaving adequate space around trees to allow them to breathe, avoiding cutting of roadside and colony trees for other utilities in the city and ensuring accountable and transparent processes in designing and executing projects.

Citizens, including several environmentalists, feel that the trees are not only a defining feature of the city but also critical for the role they play in the lives of people living in these areas. They are also vital for the bio-diversity they support. A sign-on campaign was initiated over a month and half ago, which is still going on, and a petition was submitted to the Chief Minister with the signatures of nearly a thousand people.

The basic point that the group has been raising is that destruction of trees is the result of a myopic transport planning that is destroying the green cover simply because the trees were not even considered during the inception stage. In the run-up to Tuesday's meeting, the forum has carried out surveys of specific stretches of roads that are undergoing construction of the High Capacity Bus Service (HCBS) corridor. The broad purpose of these audits was to uncover possible inaccuracy of the official tree count, whether some of these trees can be saved from the axe and the status of the re-plantation claims being made by officials.

These findings will be shared with the Chief Minister in a bid to draw attention to the entire process from the perspective of the city's tree lines. The forum has categorically asserted that the campaign is not against transport projects but against the destruction of the city's trees and environment.

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