Permission granted to cut more than 156,000 sal trees in Madhya Pradesh
The central government has approved the felling of sal (Shorea robusta) trees infested by the sal heartwood borer insect in the Amarkantak region of Madhya Pradesh, spanning the Dindori and Anuppur forest divisions.
Approval covers 146,784 trees in Dindori district and 9,535 trees in the Anuppur district's Amarkantak area, a combined total of roughly 156,300 trees.
Felling is scheduled to begin in October 2026; a workshop was held on September 17, 2026 to finalize implementation steps with forest officials.
Beyond felling, the state forest department has also deployed a "trap tree" method and purchased close to 1.9 million sal borer insects from local residents at Rs 2 per insect (about Rs 38.5 lakh spent), as a parallel biological control measure.
Sal Heartwood Borer (Hoplocerambyx spinicornis) and Sal Forest Ecology
The sal heartwood borer is a wood-boring beetle endemic to central Indian sal forests and is the single most destructive insect pest of Shorea robusta (sal), a dominant tree species of India's moist and dry deciduous forests. Its larvae tunnel into the heartwood of mature and stressed trees, causing structural damage that kills the tree and renders the timber commercially unusable.
Key Details
- Sal borer outbreaks in central India follow a roughly 30-year epidemic cycle; the last major outbreak, in 1997, damaged more than 31 lakh sal trees valued at an estimated Rs 1,200 crore, and forest officials had flagged a fresh outbreak as likely around 2026-27 based on this cycle.
- Smaller resurgences were also recorded in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh forest divisions, including tiger reserve areas, between 2012 and 2015.
- Outbreaks are typically triggered by drought-stressed or injured trees, which become more susceptible to beetle attack; climatic stress is cited as a contributing factor to the timing of the 2026-27 resurgence.
- Sanctioned felling of infested trees, combined with "trap trees" (deliberately weakened trees used to concentrate and then destroy the pest population), is the standard silvicultural control method for the pest, since chemical control is impractical at forest scale.
The felling permission for over 1.56 lakh trees is a direct pest-management response to this cyclical borer outbreak, aimed at removing already-infested (and hence doomed) trees before the insect spreads further and to salvage timber value before the wood degrades.
Forest Felling Permissions and the Indian Forest Act / Forest (Conservation) Act Framework
Tree felling within India's reserved and protected forests is regulated through a layered legal framework: the Indian Forest Act, 1927 governs day-to-day forest management, working-plan-based extraction and transit of forest produce within a state's reserved/protected forests, while the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980 requires prior Central Government approval specifically when forest land is diverted to non-forest use.
Key Details
- Under the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980, states cannot de-reserve forest land or divert it for non-forest purposes without prior approval from the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC); approval conditions typically include compensatory afforestation, generally requiring at least two trees planted (or afforestation of an equivalent non-forest area) for each tree/area felled.
- Because the sal borer felling operation involves salvage removal of infested trees within existing forest divisions — with the land remaining under forest use rather than being diverted — it is being processed as a felling/working-plan permission rather than a forest-land diversion case, which is why compensatory afforestation has not been highlighted in this instance.
- The forest divisions involved (Dindori and Anuppur/Amarkantak) fall within the landscape of the Achanakmar-Amarkantak Biosphere Reserve, a UNESCO Man and Biosphere Programme site spanning Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, where dense sal and bamboo forests form the dominant vegetation type.
The scale of felling approved here — over 1.56 lakh trees — required central government clearance precisely because of the volume involved and the ecological sensitivity of the Amarkantak landscape, even though it is a pest-control felling rather than a land-use conversion.
Sal (Shorea robusta) as a Keystone Species of Central Indian Forests
Sal is one of India's most economically and ecologically important indigenous tree species, dominating the moist and dry deciduous forests of the central Indian highlands and forming the backbone of the timber, non-timber forest produce (sal seed, leaves for plates/donas) and tribal forest-economy in states like Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha and West Bengal.
Key Details
- Sal forests are classified under the moist and dry deciduous forest types in India's forest classification system, and are a defining habitat type for central Indian tiger landscapes (e.g., Kanha, Bandhavgarh, Achanakmar).
- Amarkantak itself, located at the convergence of the Vindhya and Satpura ranges (the Maikal Hills), is the source of the Narmada, Son and Johilla rivers, making the sal-dominated forest cover here significant for both biodiversity and watershed protection.
- Large-scale sal die-off from pest attack has cascading effects on forest-dependent tribal livelihoods (dependent on sal seed and leaf collection under the Forest Rights Act, 2006) and on wildlife habitat quality in adjoining protected areas.
The scale of the sanctioned felling — over 1.56 lakh trees in a single approval — underscores how significant a mature-forest die-off event this is for a keystone species underpinning both the region's ecology and its forest-based tribal economy.
- Trees approved for felling: 146,784 in Dindori district; 9,535 in Anuppur district (Amarkantak area); total approximately 156,319 trees.
- Felling to commence: October 2026; implementation workshop held September 17, 2026.
- Pest: sal heartwood borer, Hoplocerambyx spinicornis.
- Outbreak cycle: approximately 30 years; previous major outbreak in 1997 affected over 31 lakh sal trees (~Rs 1,200 crore in value).
- Parallel control measure: ~1.9 million borer insects purchased from local residents at Rs 2 each (~Rs 38.5 lakh spent).
- Affected forest divisions lie within the Achanakmar-Amarkantak Biosphere Reserve landscape (Madhya Pradesh-Chhattisgarh), a UNESCO Man and Biosphere Programme site.