How one man is battling to save the Dwarka forest in Delhi

“The attack has left me traumatised and I have stopped going outside,” said Naveen Solanki. “I don’t know where the next threat will come from.”

Solanki is a 23-year old environmental activist from the Shahbad Mohammadpur village in Delhi’s Dwarka neighbourhood. On the afternoon of February 8, he alleges, a tractor belonging to another resident of the village, attempted to run him over. This was after Solanki had noticed the tractor dumping construction and demolition waste in the Dwarka forest earlier in the afternoon.

The forest, spanning 120 acres or around 70 football fields, is natural, self-grown and unplanned, having proliferated since 2008.

Solanki told Scroll that when he saw the waste being dumped in the forest, he immediately alerted the police and stopped the tractor from proceeding. When he saw the vehicle heading towards him, he tried to jump out of the way. But the vehicle ended up running over one of his feet.

Despite a formal police complaint containing photos of the attacker and his tractor, the authorities have refused to register a first information report till now.

Solanki says he has been in crosshairs of the alleged attacker since 2022 when he began leading efforts to protect the forest from deforestation by state agencies and waste dumping by...

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