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By:

Quaid Najmi

4 January 2025 at 3:26:24 pm

Thackerays’ ‘Taandav’ for trees, tigers

AI generated image Mumbai: Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) President Raj Thackeray launched a sharp attack on the government for the systematic degradation of the state’s environment under the garb of development, even as the climate change poses a direct threat to the environment, economy, agriculture, public health and the future of both rural and urban centres. Questioning the state government’s claims of having planted millions of trees, he rued how the World Environment Day has been...

Thackerays’ ‘Taandav’ for trees, tigers

AI generated image Mumbai: Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) President Raj Thackeray launched a sharp attack on the government for the systematic degradation of the state’s environment under the garb of development, even as the climate change poses a direct threat to the environment, economy, agriculture, public health and the future of both rural and urban centres. Questioning the state government’s claims of having planted millions of trees, he rued how the World Environment Day has been reduced to an annual ritual of tree-planting drives and clicking selfies for social media, though 90 pc of the saplings don’t survive even a day. “Only the government knows where those trees really are,” said Raj sternly. He recalled a "Blueprint of Maharashtra’s Development" he had proposed in 2015, in which he advocated how development without environmental sensitivity is hollow. Justifying, he said that the consequences are visible where roads, bridges and infrastructure projects are hailed as achievements, but even a short spell of rainfall can paralyze entire cities. Referring to recent reports on farmers returning from the fields after 10 am due to the scorching heat, Raj said that the worsening climate crisis has become an everyday reality. Citing official statistics, Raj claimed that extreme heat has caused productivity losses of nearly USD 159 billion and slashing of 160 billion work-hours annually in recent years. He mentioned the World Bank estimates that India’s GDP could plummet by 2.5-4.5 pc while 57 pc of the country’s districts sheltering 76 pc of the population stare at serious climate-related crises. Taking a swipe, he said while the governments boast about growth figures and economical rankings, they are silent on the staggering costs of environmental destruction. He questioned the development model “whether flooded cities, washed-away crops and unbearable summers” genuinely indicate progress. Claiming that Maharashtra was increasingly becoming unliveable for upto 8 months in a year, he said excessive monsoon rains disrupt rural life and urban floods cripple cities, while extreme heat make normal life a torture in summers in both urban-rural areas. Targeting the Centre, Raj alleged that nearly 173,984 hectares of forest lands were diverted in the past 11 years for mining and infrastructure projects to benefit the PM’s single favourite Adani Group. He said that these lands amount to 1,730 sqkm, or equivalent to the area of 16 Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP) that is spread over barely 104 sqkm. Dissolve state wildlife board: Aaditya Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Aditya Thackeray has accused the Maharashtra government for issuing a permit to carry out mining activity in the sensitive tiger corridor between the Tadoba-Andhari and Indravati sanctuaries housing the big striped cats. In a strongly-worded letter to the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) Member-Secretary Sanjay Kumar, Thackeray sought his immediate personal intervention, sacking the Maharashtra State Board for Wild-Life (SBWL), revoking the permit, and probe against the Chief Wildlife Warden & Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (PCCF) M. Srinivasa Reddy for the alleged lacunae. Aditya’s two-pager says the permit has been granted for “scientific exploration and excavation/systematic recovery of low-grade iron ore in existing mines in villages Hedri, Bande, Parsalgondi and Round Parsalgondi, in the Etapalli taluka of Gadchiroli district”. Last January, Aditya – MLA from Worli – had first raised the issue saying that the proposed mine would create only 120 jobs, including 32 permanent, and the estimated output is pegged at 1.1 million tons in a year. Referring to two letters of Reddy – on April 28 and May 21 – the SS (UBT) leader claimed that in communications to the state government, the PCCF had changed his stance on the issue. Aditya said that in the first letter, Reddy had effectively opposed the government plans for mining activity but in the second letter, he took a somersault, ostensibly due to government pressures or some commercial interests, “the U-turn is disgraceful and detrimental to India’s national interest” – and this abrupt shift in stance must be investigated thoroughly. In view of the contrary stance of the PCCF Reddy, entrusted with protecting the wildlife but failing to defend the NTCA and NBWL, point to serious malfunctioning of the SBWL, and hence it must be dissolved, besides reviewing all its decisions in the past three years, particularly those pertaining to hazardous activities in sensitive areas, demanded Aditya. 444 tigers roam in 11,000 sq.km As per the Status of Tiger Report (2002), and the Maharashtra Economic Survey 2025-2026, the state boasts of 444 tigers prowling in the wild along with other menacing creatures. The state’s total protected wildlife network of 88 Notified Areas of National Parks, Sanctuaries, and Conservation Reserves - including 6 dedicated to the striped big cats – is spread over 11,092 sq. kms as per current data.

Tainted Mandate

Mumbai’s narcotics enforcement apparatus has once again found itself in the dock. The booking of Amit Ghawate, the Narcotics Control Bureau’s (NCB) Mumbai zonal director, in connection with a suicide case is not merely an aberration. It is the latest episode in a pattern that raises uncomfortable questions about the conduct, culture and accountability of one of the country’s most visible law-enforcement agencies.


Ghawate, a 2008-batch Indian Revenue Service officer, now faces serious charges under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, including abetment to suicide, extortion and criminal conspiracy. The case stems from the death of Gurunath Chichkar, a Navi Mumbai builder who allegedly shot himself in April 2025. According to investigators, a suicide note pointed to sustained harassment by NCB officials pursuing his son, Naveen Chichkar, an alleged kingpin of a transnational drug syndicate.


It speaks volumes when a premier anti-narcotics agency, tasked with dismantling criminal networks that span continents, now finds one of its senior-most officers accused of tactics that resemble the very coercion and illegality it is meant to combat.


This is not the first time the Mumbai arm of the NCB has courted controversy. The tenure of Sameer Wankhede, Ghawate’s predecessor, was marked by headline-grabbing drug busts and equally explosive allegations. Wankhede’s tenure, once hailed as emblematic of a no-nonsense crackdown, now reads more like a cautionary tale in institutional overreach. His high-profile raids, most notably the Cordelia cruise ship case, initially projected the image of an officer unafraid to take on Bollywood, business elites and political networks alike. Yet, as allegations of extortion surfaced, alongside claims of selective leaks and procedural improprieties, the narrative began to fray. Investigations by central agencies into his conduct cast a long shadow over cases that were once trumpeted as breakthroughs.


The recurrence of such controversies suggests something deeper than individual misconduct. It points to structural incentives that reward spectacle over substance.


The Chichkar case is instructive. Law enforcement agencies often argue that pressure is an unavoidable tool when dealing with hardened criminal networks. Yet the line between legitimate investigation and harassment is a thin one. If the allegations against Ghawate hold, they indicate not just a failure of judgement but a systemic tolerance for excess.


Such excess is particularly dangerous in the context of India’s stringent narcotics laws. There is also a broader institutional cost. Public trust in enforcement agencies is a fragile commodity. When successive Mumbai NCB chiefs become synonymous with scandal, it risks turning the agency’s regional office into a byword for controversy rather than competence.


The NCB’s mandate is both necessary and daunting. But effectiveness in such a battle depends not only on aggression but on credibility. An agency that appears compromised cannot command the cooperation it needs from the public or from other institutions.


In the war on drugs, the state must occupy the moral high ground. When its agents descend into controversy, that ground begins to shift irreversibly. 


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