Green India Mission, launched in 2011 by then Union minister of environment and forests Jairam Ramesh, was an ambitious project to tackle climate change by both increasing manifold the country’s green cover and conserving the existing 69 million forested hectares.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, also chairman of National Action Plan on Climate Change, while launching this project by planting a peepal sapling in New Delhi, had asked all states to develop a 10-year perspective plan for extensive and phased plantation. In Jharkhand, five districts — Seraikela-Kharsawan, Garhwa, Deoghar, Lohardaga and Chatra — were chosen as part of GIM’s phase one drive.

Going against its reputation of being lackadaisical for once, the state forest department prepared a detailed project report and sent it to the Centre the same year.

Two years down the line, GIM — one of the eight missions under the National Action Plan on Climate Change — seems to have depleted faster than Jharkhand’s green cover. The reason for this isn’t known, but once Ramesh was transferred to the Union ministry of rural development, the project lost steam.

Across India, GIM aimed to reach an annual carbon dioxide sequestration — the amount of carbon dioxide the forest cover can absorb — of 50 to 60 million tonnes by 2020. It had also focussed on improving ecosystem services, including biodiversity and regeneration of barren land, and aimed to increase the income from forest-based livelihoods for three million families.

Principal chief conservator of forests (PCCF) of Jharkhand state’s wasteland development board A.K. Mishra said the USP of the mission was that it offered scope for plantation beyond forest areas.

“All plantation activities are usually on forest lands, but many areas in Jharkhand are non-forested and barren. Had the GIM been rolled out properly, wasteland could have been developed in a major way in Jharkhand. Development of wasteland is hardly done since the state was formed,” said Mishra, who also held the charge of state forest development agency (SFDA) looking after GIM in state till some months ago.

Now, the project is being looked after by additional PCCF ranked official P.C. Mishra, the present head of SFDA.

“It is tough to talk about the fate of (GIM) as funds are awaited. When it was announced, we sent a proposal of Rs 4 crore and received half in 2012-13, which got distributed to divisions concerned. The rest hasn’t arrived and we don’t know when it will come,” he said.

Sources in SFDA said some plantation and landscaping work had started but came to a grinding halt without funds flow.

With the GIM all but stalled, its critics are baring their claws.

“A minister in-charge announces schemes and gets publicity. The next minister comes and the previous one’s project fizzles out. That’s the trend. With Ramesh gone from MoEF, no one in New Delhi is interested. We sent many reminders for funds but to no avail,” said a source.

The problem doesn’t end here.

“There are too many plantation and afforestation schemes such as social forestry, FDA, MGNREGS, CAMPA, not to forget GIM, with all overlapping each other. A divisional forest official, entrusted to implement plantation at ground level is so confused or hemmed in by targets of all many schemes that everything fails. Add to it the tonnes of paperwork of schemes that leaves one with hardly any time for fieldwork. Consolidate all schemes under one roof, work out guidelines, distribute money through different channels and focus on one target,” said a senior forest official.