Greening Gzb: Soon, 100 acre forest on the banks of Hindon

Scaffoldings on mould, boating in the river lake, aquatic animals,  fruit gardens, herbal gardens — the Ghaziabad Development Authority is working to put all these features together so that visitors can have an actual feeling of forest tour in its upcoming 100 acre city forest on the banks of Hindon River. The upcoming forest hailed as the lung of Ghaziabad by the vice chairperson of GDA Santosh Kumar Yadav will actually yield green area of 600 acres it connects two adjoining green areas — 125 acres green area of Hindon Airforce and 350 acres forest area of Hindon river.

Expressing his enthusiasm Yadav organised a media trip to the the site where digging for lakes, planned plantations, gardening and road making were on full swing. ‘We will dedicate the forest to public in two phases. The first phase of 25 acres would be open by Diwali and second by next Diwali,’ said Santosh Kumar Yadav immediately after cutting the ribbon of his flagship project. ‘It’s one of the five projects I had committed to UP chief minister Akhilesh Yadav to deliver to people of Ghaziabad in the very first meeting,’ he added. 

‘The concept of project came from my family members who emphasised to create an ecological niche in the city to balance massive concretisation of real estate and infrastructure. GDA 

has a target to plant 50,000 samplings in the upcoming forest.’

The trip started with Gopi Sarovar of around half an acre which is being built to store the urine of cows in the adjoining Kanha Goshala. ‘We will dilute the urine to use it for irrigation of gardens and also cow dung would be used as natural manures,’ informed Yadav adding the disposal of these two products were also tedious work which are solved now. 

The fleet of over one dozen government vehicles lead by VC rolled in the forest area of which a small part has under-construction soil roads but rest of the part has reminded us real dense forest. ‘This lake will be developed with aquatic plants and some fishes without much concrete work,’said Yadav indicating a digging site where massive machines were on work. The authority has planned to develop around five natural lakes in the area but no concrete work. The forest will also be connected from Rajnagar Extension side with a light bridge and a boating area of 500 meter is planned in the Hindon river on Highway side.

‘The Archaeological Survey of India has permitted us to develop this mound of 25 acres on which we would make nature friendly huts, scaffoldings with facility of binoculars,’said Yadav indicating the vast green area in the surrounding. Besides a deer park, rabbit park, herbal garden, grasslands, natural forest area with some wild animals will also be development. The blue cows are already present here. The trip ended with plantation by VC, officers and journalists.