Nagpur: BJP MLC Girish Vyas has demanded that Nagpur Improvement Trust ( NIT ) should undertake replantation against dead saplings within the city limits, and not in Nagpur metro region. Unless this is done, the city areas would suffer injustice, he said.He made this demand after NIT asked plantation agency BVG India to undertake replantation at sites different from those where the saplings had died. These alternative sites include the metro region.Vyas has written to NIT chairman Dipak Mhaisekar, stressing that creating green spaces in the metro region should be the job of Nagpur Metropolitan Region Development Authority (NMRDA). "Instead of planting saplings along roads and in open spaces of the city, replantation is being done in metro region, which is a fraud perpetrated on residents of Nagpur," said the MLC.The letter written on July 14 states that while Mhaisekar had ordered BVG to do replantation, he is yet to announce the number of saplings to be replanted. Vyas also charged that the replies given by NIT officials regarding his queries on plantation scam were a complete cover up.NIT chairman Dipak Mhaisekar told TOI that he was ready to undertake replantation inside the city provided enough space was available. "I have to replant 70,000 saplings, so there is ample scope. I want to plant at least 1,000 saplings at a spot so that there is accountability. Even if it is done in metro region, it will benefit the city only," he said.The BJP leader, who has exposed a tree plantation scam in NIT, charged that BVG India met only 35% of the plantation target but was paid the entire amount by NIT officials. Following this, Mhaisekar had urged the state government to appoint botanical experts to probe the plantation scam.The chairman had recently suspended seven NIT staffers for their involvement in the scam. These include a junior engineer, a head gardener and five gardeners. He has also issued show cause notices to 25 officers, including superintending engineers Sunil Gujjelwar and Satish Pasebandh.The Accountant General's office had estimated that NIT had lost Rs3.26 crore due to shoddy plantation work by BVG. NIT officials, however, gave a certificate to the agency terming its work as excellent.

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