aurangabad conservationists have expressed dissent over fresh treecutting at the priyadarshini garden in the cidco area of the city the site where memorial of late shiv sena chief balasaheb thackeray is coming up the aurangabad municipal corporation amc has defended its action by maintaining that only exotic old tress were cut and the loss has been replenished by planting new native trees honorary wildlife warden for aurangabad kishor pathak on tuesday alleged that work of setting up the memorial was getting carried out at the cost of local ecology even if chief minister uddhav thackeray had assured that greencover at the memorial site would be kept intact the civic authorities are cutting trees in an indiscriminate manner we are not against the memorial but the same should not damage the local biodiversity he saidspread over seven hectares the memorial site is known as preferred habitats of many birds besides home to other flora and fauna when contacted amc garden superintendent vijay patil said some old trees of subabul river tamarind and nilgiri eucalyptus along with giripushp gliricidia that were in the way of construction were removed the trees that were removed are of exotic species and very old to replenish the loss we have planted 274 trees on a range of native varieties in general more than five trees are planted per one axed tree he said patil said the upcoming memorial will witness cultivation of around 4500 native trees in days to come with wide variety of native trees the memorial will serve as true oxygen hub and biodiversity hotspot of aurangabad he added