On measurement politics, murdered enforcement officers, and watching Delhi's last green barrier disappear

I grew up in Vasant Kunj, in the shadow of the Aravallis. Not the dramatic peaks that postcards celebrate—these were modest, scrubby hills that marked where South Delhi ended and something older began. We called the junction Andheria Mor, the "dark crossing," named for the dense forest that once swallowed the light. As children, we'd go on family trips to the ridge, past the Qutub Minar, into terrain that felt wild and permanent.

It wasn't permanent. Over three decades, I watched those hills shrink. The forest thinned. The "dark crossing" became just another intersection choked with traffic. Where leopards once prowled close enough to make evening news, apartment complexes now rise. The Aravalli ridge that curved through South Delhi—the northernmost tip of a 2.5-billion-year-old mountain system—has been sliced, encroached, and built over until what remains feels like an afterthought rather than a barrier.

This November, the Supreme Court made it official. A new definition accepted by the Court establishes that only landforms rising 100 metres or more above local relief qualify as "Aravalli Hills." By this measure, 91% of the hills mapped by the Forest Survey of India no longer count. The ridge I grew up beside—never 100 metres tall, always ecologically vital—has been defined out of existence.

This essay is about how that happened. It's about the gap between policy promises and ground reality, between a ₹16,053 crore restoration project and a definitional change that activists warn will be "catastrophic." It's about a DSP murdered for trying to stop illegal mining, about groundwater that has dropped from 10 metres to 1,500 feet, about a mining mafia that operates with apparent impunity. At the same time, WhatsApp groups alert them to police raids. And it's about what we lose when we choose not to see.

The World's Oldest Mountains

The Aravallis are old in ways that defy comprehension. At 2.5 billion years, they predate the Himalayas by two billion years, predate complex life on Earth, and predate the oxygenation of the atmosphere. They are among the oldest fold mountains on Earth, remnants of a time when the Indian subcontinent was part of a different supercontinent.

Once, they rivalled the Himalayas in height. Geological time has worn them down to what the Wildlife Institute of India calls "remnant mountains"—a 692-kilometre spine running from Gujarat through Rajasthan and Haryana to Delhi. Their modesty is deceptive. These eroded hills perform functions that newer, taller mountains cannot replicate: they serve as a barrier between the Thar Desert and the Indo-Gangetic plains, as the lungs of North India, and as an aquifer that sustains Delhi-NCR's water supply.

The range is also a hydrological boundary. Rivers flow in opposite directions from their crests—the Chambal, Sabarmati, and Luni to the west; the Banas and tributaries eastward. The fractured quartzite and schist formations act as giant sponges, allowing rainwater to percolate into underground aquifers that sustain millions. The Central Ground Water Board confirms that the Aravallis recharge 20-30% of groundwater in the National Capital Region.

And they are the last barrier against the desert. The Wildlife Institute's 2017 study identified 12 breaches in the Aravalli chain—gaps opened by mining and deforestation—through which Thar Desert dust now flows directly into Delhi. The imagery is stark: imagine a green wall with holes punched through it, and sand pouring through each gap.

The Definition Game

India has spent three decades arguing over what, exactly, an Aravalli is.

The legal framework began with the T.N. Godavarman case in 1996, when the Supreme Court held that "forest" must be understood by its dictionary meaning—not by formal classification. This brought the Aravalli terrain under protection regardless of whether states had designated it as forest land. The M.C. Mehta case built on this foundation, resulting in a comprehensive mining ban in May 2009 covering approximately 448 square kilometres across the Faridabad, Gurugram, and Mewat districts. Justice Kapadia declared that the "Aravalli Hill Range has to be protected at any cost."

The question of what constituted "Aravalli" remained contested. Rajasthan applied a 100-metre threshold from 2006. Haryana had no official definition—a deliberate ambiguity that allowed flexibility in enforcement. When the Supreme Court asked the Forest Survey of India to develop criteria in 2010, FSI produced a terrain-based definition: slopes greater than 3 degrees, 100-metre foothill buffers, 500-metre inter-hill distances. Crucially, there was no height threshold. Under this methodology, 40,483 square kilometres across 15 Rajasthan districts qualified as Aravalli terrain.

In February 2010, the Supreme Court explicitly rejected a 100-metre threshold proposed by some parties. The Court understood what the government's committee later chose to ignore: even hills rising only 10-30 metres serve critical ecological functions as wind barriers and groundwater recharge zones.

Then came the reversal. In May 2024, the Court ordered a committee to formulate a "uniform definition." The committee—led by MoEFCC—recommended the 100-metre threshold despite explicit opposition from the Forest Survey of India, the Central Empowered Committee, and the Supreme Court's own amicus curiae K. Parameshwar. On 20 November 2025, the Court nevertheless accepted the definition.

The mathematics are devastating. Of 12,081 hills mapped in Rajasthan's Aravallis, only 1,048—8.7%—exceed 100 metres. When including all recorded hills and slopes, 99.12% would be excluded from the Aravalli classification. Three entire districts—Sawai Madhopur, Chittorgarh, and Nagaur—lose Aravalli status completely because their hills don't reach the threshold.

The FSI's metaphor captures the absurdity: the 100-metre definition "would protect only a few guard posts while surrendering the fences below."

When the Air Turns Brown

My children have breathing problems every winter. They're not unusual—most Delhi kids do. We've normalised the sight of AQI readings above 400, of schools closing for "pollution holidays," of N95 masks as routine accessories. What we've failed to connect is how much of this stems from the hills we're destroying.

The IIT Kanpur comprehensive study commissioned by the Delhi Pollution Control Committee identified road dust as the most significant contributor to PM10 pollution, accounting for up to 26% during the summer months. But where does this dust come from? FSI studies documented that PM2.5 and PM10 levels rise 4-6 times during dust events that pass through the Aravalli gaps. The breaches in the mountain barrier have become highways for Thar sand.

The May 2018 dust storms killed over 125 people across North India, with wind speeds reaching 100 km/hour. A peer-reviewed study in GeoHealth noted that "people living in the IGP region had not experienced dust storms of this magnitude in the last three decades." Delhi recorded 18 dust weather days in that single month. During the November 2017 Gulf dust storm, SAFAR recorded transboundary dust contributing 40% to Delhi's pollution, with PM2.5 concentrations peaking at 640 µg/m³.

The temperature data is equally alarming. A TERI School analysis of Landsat imagery documented that Gurugram's built-up area expanded from 10% to 45% between 1990 and 2018, with a direct correlation between impervious surfaces and land surface temperature. Gurugram's average summer temperature has risen by 1.5°C over the last decade, with areas lacking vegetation recording daytime temperatures up to 7°C higher than green zones.

Climate scientist Harini Nagendra's warning is stark: if Aravalli degradation continues, "Delhi's climate could shift toward semi-desert conditions within decades." The expansion threatening North India is primarily "atmospheric and wind-driven, manifesting as intense dust storms, suspended particulate matter, and heat transfer"—containable only through a contiguous physical windbreaker.

We are dismantling that windbreaker, one hill at a time.

The Water Beneath

If the air quality crisis feels abstract—just another Delhi winter problem—the groundwater collapse is viscerally concrete. In the Mahendergarh district, water levels have fallen to 1,500-2,000 feet. Farmers spend ₹8-10 lakhs per borewell, with no guarantee of hitting water. Eight of the district's blocks are classified as "over-exploited," with rivers such as Dohan and Krishnawati completely dried up.

The mechanism is straightforward. The Aravallis' fractured rock formations—quartzites, phyllites, dolomites containing natural fissures—act as recharge zones where rainwater percolates into underground aquifers. Destroy the hills, and you destroy the sponge. Across Haryana, 76% of areas have experienced a decline in the water table over the past decade, with groundwater extraction at 135.96% of annual recharge—drawing 12.72 billion cubic metres against 10.32 billion cubic metres of replenishment.

Gurugram's trajectory illustrates where this leads. Water table levels dropped from 12-15 metres in 1986 to over 40 metres by 2024, declining 1-3 metres annually. A 2004 Supreme Court petition documented groundwater extraction at 311% of sustainable yield. The Centre for Science and Environment warned that once water tables drop below 200 metres, "only rocks will be left."

Badkal Lake offers a case study. Constructed after Independence as a reservoir between two Aravalli hills, it thrived for decades as a tourist destination, attracting boaters and birdwatchers. By 2009, it had dried entirely, attributed to unchecked mining in neighbouring areas that obstructed groundwater flow and damaged underlying aquifers. A ₹79-₹100 crore revival project launched in 2018 has missed five deadlines and remains incomplete.

Faridabad faces additional consequences: land subsidence rates increased from 2.15 cm/year (2014-2016) to 7.83 cm/year (2018-2019)—directly linked to groundwater extraction. The ground beneath our feet is literally sinking.

The Citizens' Report: District by District

The most comprehensive ground-truthing of Aravalli destruction is provided by the Citizens' Report on the Haryana Aravallis, produced by the People for Aravallis collective and submitted to MoEFCC in May 2025. Led by Neelam Ahluwalia—a London School of Economics graduate with 27 years of experience in conservation—and endorsed by the "Waterman of India," Rajendra Singh, the report documents field visits to all seven Aravalli districts and provides geo-tagged evidence of more than 60 illegal mining locations.

Charkhi Dadri is the most devastated. "Every Aravalli hill was given for mining leases from 2015 onwards." Other than one range under a plantation project, the entire Aravalli terrain was allocated for extraction. In Ramalwas village, mining exceeded permitted depths—300 feet versus the approved 180 feet—contaminating drinking water and causing skin problems. Approximately 20 tube wells stopped functioning. The village's 1,803 registered voters boycotted the 2024 assembly elections in protest.

Bhiwani is where "licensed mining is destroying most of the Aravalli hills. Only a few small hillocks are left." The Dadam mining zone scandal exemplifies the pattern. In January 2022, five workers were killed in a landslide when Govardhan Mines and Minerals mined to a depth of 109 metres versus the approved 78 metres. Two more workers died in April 2022. The Enforcement Directorate confirmed losses exceeding ₹1,200 crore attributable to illegal mining between 2017 and 2022.

Mahendergarh faces both a mining crisis and a groundwater crisis. Ground-truthing in February 2024 found 24 sites requiring restoration. The district hosts 107 stone crushing units and 68 grinding units.

Nuh, Gurugram, and Faridabad—covered by the 2009 Supreme Court mining ban—continue to experience what the report calls "brazen" illegal mining at more than 40 documented locations. In December 2024, an entire hillock in Rava village was blown to pieces overnight, with 6,000 metric tonnes illegally extracted in a single operation. A geospatial probe revealed 25 acres of unlawful mining between 2011 and 2025, with losses exceeding 80 lakh tonnes.

The revenue data quantifies the policy-reality gap: mining revenue from four Haryana districts increased from ₹5.15 crore in 2013-14 to ₹363.5 crore in 2023-24—a 7,060% increase in ten years. This occurred despite Supreme Court bans, NGT orders, and repeated assurances of enforcement.

The Murder of DSP Surender Singh

On 19 July 2022, DSP Surender Singh received intelligence about illegal stone mining in Nuh district. The 57-year-old officer, four months from retirement, conducted a surprise inspection at Pachgaon village. When he signalled a stone-laden dumper to stop, the driver, Shabir, accelerated and ran him over.

The Justice L.N. Mittal Commission found that none of the police officials accompanying Singh was armed during the raid. The mining mafia had grown confident enough to murder a senior officer in broad daylight.

This was not an aberration. The mining mafia operates as a sophisticated network: hills "sell" through illegal auctions for ₹1-5 crore; initial village payments of ₹25,000 have escalated to ₹5-10 lakh; WhatsApp groups provide real-time alerts about police raids; women and children are deployed as lookouts. An internal Mines Department report alleged that at least 30 ruling-party MLAs were directly involved in the mining industry.

The Supreme Court itself observed in May 2025 that "it appears that the mafia is strong enough to protect not only its members but also the officers of the state government who have acted in collusion with them." The CEC documented an unauthorised 1.5-kilometre road built through the Aravalli forest by the mining mafia, "in collusion with state officials," for transporting illegally mined stones.

The "hit and slide" methodology exploits the Haryana-Rajasthan border. Miners deploy machinery on the Rajasthan side to blast hillocks; stones fall onto the Haryana side; workers flee with material while jurisdictional confusion prevents enforcement. The CAG found over 60% of illegal mining cases registered near the Haryana border. In 2023, over eight crore metric tonnes vanished from the Nuh hills—losses exceeding ₹2,100 crore—with no significant action taken.

Haryana has 46 of 63 mining inspector posts vacant. Despite promises of drone surveillance after Singh's murder, mining resumed within two months.

The Land Beneath the Hills

The current land dynamics trace back to the 1970s. Before then, the Aravalli terrain was classified as shamlat deh (village common land) or gair mumkin pahar (uncultivable hills), with ownership vested in village panchayats. Revenue authorities then facilitated what Mongabay terms "dubious privatisation"—the transfer of shares in common land to stakeholders, who sold parcels to real estate agents anticipating profits from urbanisation.

The economic incentives are enormous. Land values in Gurugram now range from an average of ₹4,967/sq ft to ₹35,000/sq ft in premium zones. Between 2019 and 2024, peripheral corridors experienced nearly a twofold increase in prices. Converting protected Aravalli land into developable real estate represents a value of thousands of crores.

The Natural Conservation Zone framework—covering 1,22,113 hectares where real estate was prohibited—has been systematically eroded. An MoEFCC report in 2019 recommended a 47% decrease in Haryana's NCZs. An August 2021 state committee decision effectively wiped out 20,000 acres of Aravalli forests in Faridabad by claiming revenue records "do not make any mention of the term 'Aravalli.'" Draft NCR Regional Plan 2041 proposes replacing "Natural Conservation Zone" with simply "Natural Zone"—dropping "Conservation" from the terminology.

The Kant Enclave case illustrates the realities of enforcement. Built on 425 acres in Faridabad's Anangpur village—buyers included a former Chief Justice of India and MPs—the Supreme Court ordered demolition in 2018, calling violations "quite frightening." Yet the farmhouse economy persists: approximately 450 farmhouses were sold in the Raisina area alone. Meanwhile, Patanjali acquired more than 400 acres of common land in the Aravallis, while Haryana kept the protections unnotified.

The Green Wall Contradiction

In June 2025, Prime Minister Modi relaunched the Aravalli Green Wall Project—a ₹16,053 crore initiative to restore over 1.15 million hectares across 29 districts. The project promises 50 million native trees, 1,000 permanent nurseries, and 20+ restored wetlands. It contributes to India's commitment under the UNCCD to restore 26 million hectares of degraded land by 2030.

Five months later, the same government's Environment Ministry successfully proposed a definition that could exclude 90% of the Aravallis from protection. The contradiction is not subtle. As Down to Earth noted, launching restoration while narrowing protection creates "a determined assault on ecological balance" dressed as environmental stewardship. The fundamental tension: 70% of Aravalli land degradation is attributed to illegal mining, yet the new definition opens previously protected areas to mining pressure.

Africa's Great Green Wall—the inspiration for India's project—offers cautionary lessons. After 18 years, only 4% of the 100-million-hectare target has been achieved. Key failure factors include funding gaps (only $2.5 billion of the required $30 billion has been spent) and insufficient community ownership.

Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav defends the policy, noting that only 0.19% of the Aravalli landscape is eligible for mining. Critics respond that this translates to approximately 68,000 acres—and more importantly, areas losing Aravalli classification lose the legal basis for enforcement against future encroachment.

The Political Economy of Invisibility

Why does India choose not to protect its mountains?

The answer parallels the migration invisibility I've written about before: structural incentives that reward extraction over conservation, combined with measurement systems designed to minimise what the state must see.

Consider the definitional game in which the Forest Survey of India mapped 12,081 hills, creating 12,081 potential obstacles to mining permits. Redefine "Aravalli" to include only hills above 100 metres, and suddenly 11,033 obstacles disappear. The landscape hasn't changed—only what the state chooses to recognise.

Consider the federalism trap. Neither Haryana nor Rajasthan has electoral incentives to protect the border hills. Mining generates revenue; enforcement generates conflict with powerful interests. The 30+ MLAs allegedly involved in mining represent votes and campaign funds. A murdered DSP represents a problem to manage, not a system to reform.

Consider who bears costs versus who captures benefits. The mining mafia extracts thousands of crores; real estate developers profit from land conversion; state treasuries collect royalties. The costs—depleted aquifers, polluted air, destroyed ecosystems—are diffuse, long-term, and borne by people without political voice. Farmers in Mahendergarh who drill to depths of 2,000 feet for water have less influence than contractors with connections.

Former Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot called it plainly: the government is "conspiring to sell Aravallis to benefit mining interests." Whether one accepts that framing or not, the outcome is clear: three decades of legal protection are being unwound through a definitional technicality.

What Would Protection Look Like?

The solutions are not mysterious. They require political will that the current architecture actively discourages.

Enforce existing law. The 2009 mining ban remains in force on paper. The Inter-State Migrant Workmen Act mandates registration and the maintenance of decent conditions for mining workers. The Forest Conservation Act requires clearance for the diversion of forest land. Almost none of this is implemented. Start by filling the 46 vacant posts of mining inspectors in Haryana.

Fix the definition. The FSI's terrain-based criteria—slopes, buffers, connectivity—capture ecological function rather than arbitrary height. The amicus curiae recommended this approach. The CEC supported it. The Court chose otherwise, but that choice can be revisited.

Address the federalism gap. Inter-state coordination on border enforcement is currently ad hoc—police calling counterparts after the fact. A statutory framework with joint jurisdiction and shared penalties could close the loopholes exploited by the "hit and slide" methodology.

Make destruction visible. The Citizens' Report demonstrates that civil society documentation can reveal what official monitoring misses. Satellite monitoring, publicly accessible datasets, and citizen science can foster accountability when government capacity is lacking.

Value ecosystem services. The Aravallis provide groundwater recharge, dust mitigation, temperature regulation, and biodiversity habitat, which are worth far more than mining royalties. Until these values are formally incorporated into decision-making—through natural capital accounting, payment for ecosystem services, or simple cost-benefit analysis that includes externalities—the incentive structure will continue favouring extraction.

The View from Andheria Mor

I travelled through Andheria Mor recently. The name survives, but the darkness doesn't—the forest is too thin to block light anymore. What remains of the ridge is hemmed by apartment towers, their marketing promising "panoramic views" of terrain that shrinks with each construction cycle.

My children don't know what they've lost. They've never seen leopards in the news from South Delhi, nor have they travelled into genuinely wild terrain at the city's edge. For them, the Aravallis are an abstraction—something mentioned in textbooks, perhaps visible on a clear day from a high floor.

The #SaveAravalli campaign has collected more than 41,000 signatures. Protests have erupted across Rajasthan and Haryana. Thirty-seven retired IFS officers wrote to the Prime Minister opposing related development projects. Congress leaders have announced plans to approach the Supreme Court in January 2026.

Whether any of this changes outcomes depends on whether India can recognise that mountains below 100 metres are still mountains—that ecological function matters more than arbitrary thresholds, that ancient landscapes have value beyond what can be extracted and sold.

The Aravallis have survived 2.5 billion years of geological time. Whether they survive the next few decades of Indian development is now an open question.

Further reading:

1. Citizens' Report on Haryana Aravallis (People for Aravallis, May 2025)

2. How the Supreme Court's new definition of the Aravalli redraws the landscape (The Leaflet, November 2025)

3. The Aravalli range is Delhi's shield against the Thar (Down to Earth, November 2025)

4. Plunder of the Aravallis risks lives in north India (Mongabay India, 2018)

5. Ecologies of Obfuscation: What's Happening to the Aravalli Hills? (The Wire, 2024)