Only about half of the trees planted by the Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Limited (MMRCL) inside Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP) as part of its compensatory afforestation programme have survived, according to a compliance affidavit filed by the Maharashtra government before the Supreme Court of India.

The affidavit, submitted in the ongoing suo motu case on tree-felling in Aarey forest, includes reports from both the SGNP Forest Department and Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-Bombay, assessing MMRCL’s ecological commitments linked to the Aarey Metro Car Shed Project and related tunnelling works.