If there was a compelling reason to make it easy to cut down a coconut tree, the Forest Minister did not share it with the Assembly last week and this has rightly resulted in doomsday prophets having a field day. The House finally passed an amendment which declassified the coconut tree as a tree and consigned it to the level of grass and the opposition walked out in protest. Even while declassifying it, the Forest Minister assured the House that all possible protection would be extended to the coconut tree, which is like legalising poaching and then saying all animals will be protected. It rankles.
Prior to the amendment, the permission of the forest department was required to cut a coconut tree. Now anyone can cut a coconut tree as if it were some plant in the backyard. The explanation offered by the government, and a feeble one, was that coconut trees were the cause of neighbourly fights and the amendment would perhaps, ease the tension. It might be recalled that in 2010 the High Court of Bombay at Goa had, in a neighbour versus neighbour case, ruled that a coconut tree could not be cut just because coconuts or dried palms fell in the someone else’s property. This could have triggered a rethink, but is Goa going through social turmoil on account of fights over coconut trees, to pass the bill? The explanation offered by the government is not satisfactory.
The coconut tree never enjoyed the status of tree until 2008 when the Digambar Kamat government included it in the act, after it was noticed that coconut production in the state had fallen. Since then, the number of trees has increased and so has coconut production. Of course, it is not as though everyone is going to go to start chopping coconut trees because the tradition in Goa is to plant coconut trees and not cut them, but the thought that it can be done more easily hangs like a sword over the identity of the State which is often described as the land of swaying coconut trees.
On the other hand, coconut plantation owners have welcomed the amendment because it cuts red tape and makes it easier to cut a tree that is either dead or dangerous. It is a fact that obtaining permission from the forest department is tedious and time consuming. The question is, why couldn’t the government simplify the process in the case of coconut tree instead of removing it from the act?
Goa was once self-sufficient in coconut production. Now it has to import nuts from neighbouring states. It is this situation which prompted the Kamat government to protect the coconut tree. Now that it is denotified, the Forest Minister will have to keep a watch over the number of trees cut and the number of nuts produced as these figures will tell us if the State is slipping into the danger zone.
At the time of passage of the amendment, the Forest Minister promised to extend special protection to the coconut tree. Like any other tree, the coconut tree also needs protection, but because it is also a plantation tree, it requires a different set of rules. The Forest Minister will now have to explain how he intends to protect the coconut tree if he wishes to blunt the propaganda value the amendment has for the opposition.
