Environmentalists fighting to save Aarey Colony are up in arms against Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation (MMRC) — a body looking after the execution of the proposed Metro 3 (Colaba-Bandra-SEEPZ) — that in its latest affidavit submitted to the National Green Tribunal (NGT) on Monday has claimed that the area is neither a vast grassland nor a dense forest.

Vanashakti, an NGO, had filed a plea with the NGT against the proposed Metro 3 car depot as well as getting Aarey Colony notified as a No Development Zone. Reacting to the affidavit whose copy was sent on Saturday to the NGO, director of projects Stalin D said: "How can MMRC claim that Aarey is not a forest and say it is simply a stretch of government owned land when the forest department itself in its affidavit had stated that entire Aarey Colony is shown as eco-senstive area. We are in the process of preparing a strong and fitting reply to the MMRC, which has been taking the citizens for a ride."

It was in October that chief minister Devendra Fadanavis accepted the six-member expert committee report suggesting Kanjurmarg as an alternative for the Metro 3 car depot (Colaba-Bandra-SEEPZ) instead of constructing one at Aarey Milk Colony.

In fact, it has been learnt that two members of the panel — IIT Mumbai Professor Dr Shyam Asolekar and Dr Rakesh Kumar of Neeri — had signed a dissent note stating that they did not agree with the conclusions drawn which said that if MMRC cannot get the Kanjurmarg land in three months they would go for the space in Aarey Colony.

Activists from Aarey Conservation Group shared that the MMRC is now claiming there was no alternative for constructing the car shed in Aarey Colony and that it is now ready to construct it in 20.82 hectares instead of earlier 30 hectares and instead of over 2,300 trees only 500 trees will have to be cut.

"We don't understand what is the hurry for MMRC to begin the work at Aarey. It appears that without the Aarey land, the metro in Mumbai cant be constructed," informed an activist.

Anand Pendharkar, a naturalist, said: "We have been documenting the biodiversity of Aarey Colony since 1986 and we can state that with the kind of flora and fauna it is home to, it can easily be declared a sanctuary. In fact, it was part of SGNP before it was handed over to the dairy department and today its a perfect example of man in biosphere reserve."

"There isn't any notification from the government declaring Aarey Milk Colony as a forest," said an official from Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation (MMRC). According to him, Aarey Milk Colony is nothing but an open area and as per the development plan, it is a No-Development Zone of the state government.

"Additionally, the state government had kept the area untouched and open for dairy development activity. An open area can be either a barren land or a grassland. It is because there are trees here, some people want to declare it as a forest," added the official.

WHY ACTIVIST SAY AAREY IS A 'FOREST'Aarey Colony is spread over 12 sq km and is located next to Sanjay Gandhi National Park. A detailed study on biodiversity of the area by ecologists Rajesh Sanap and Zeeshan Mirza found that Aarey is home to 76 species of birds, 86 species of butterflies, 13 species of amphibians, 38 different types of reptiles, 19 spiders and 34 different types of wild flowers. The report also states that Aarey has a wide variety of mammals including leopards, spotted deer, rusty spotted cat, jungle cat, civets, the sambar deer and barking deer.

In a recent camera trapping study done by Nikit Surve from WII to find abundance of leopards, Aarey colony was included. The final report stated that the total number of leopards in 140 sq km area of SGNP, including Aarey Colony, was 35.