Guwahati: The Green India Mission has achieved only a fraction of its targeted expansion in forest cover, falling 97.57% short of the goal set under the programme, according to a Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report tabled in Parliament on August 13.
The audit found that the mission increased forest cover across only 0.03409 million hectares against the target of 1.4 million hectares during the period under review.
The CAG examined the implementation of the Environment Ministry’s Green India Mission in 16 states and Union Territories between 2015-16 and 2024-25. The scheme seeks to increase forest and tree cover, strengthen ecosystem services, and support livelihoods dependent on forests.
According to the audit, inadequate planning, limited coordination among agencies and insufficient funding were among the key factors behind the programme’s poor performance.
The report pointed to weak convergence between the Green India Mission and other afforestation and rural employment programmes. Initiatives such as CAMPA, MGNREGS, Nagar Van Yojana and the School Nursery Yojana were found to be operating without adequate integration with the mission.
The CAG also found shortcomings in the selection of project areas. A bottom-up process involving local-level assessment was not consistently followed, while some areas with comparatively lower climate vulnerability were selected instead of locations facing greater climate-related risks.
Funding emerged as another major concern. For the first four years of the scheme, the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs had approved an outlay of Rs 2,000 crore from the 12th Plan, while Rs 400 crore was envisaged through 13th Finance Commission grants as the states’ contribution.
However, the mission received only Rs 1,149.14 crore in budgetary support over its 10-year implementation period from 2015-16 to 2024-25, amounting to 47.88% of the approved allocation, the audit found.
The CAG also identified weaknesses in financial record-keeping. Eight states and Union Territories did not maintain annual accounts, while in other cases accounts were either not audited or contained discrepancies when compared with subsidiary records.
Monitoring of the mission’s environmental outcomes was also found to be inadequate. Except for Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, no state assessed carbon sequestration resulting from the programme during the 2015-16 to 2024-25 period.
The audit further raised concerns over the reliability of reported achievements. It found instances where results appeared overstated because KML files used for validation had not been properly verified.
GIS-based assessment of sampled locations provided further evidence of limited impact, with around 70% of the sites examined showing no discernible change attributable to the Green India Mission.
The findings point to significant gaps in planning, funding, monitoring and coordination that have limited the programme’s ability to meet its forest expansion objectives over the past decade.