The Supreme Court on Monday gave the go-ahead for felling of 4,313 trees on the 76-km Taj Trapezium Zone stretch in Uttar Pradesh for the Dedicated Freight Corridor project by the railways, funded by the World Bank.

A bench of Justices D.K. Jain and Madan B. Lokur allowed the plea of the Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India (DFCCI) after deliberations over the Forest Department’s definition of trees, as the bench had earlier sought clarification on whether saplings and trunks measuring four to five inches in diameter can be called trees.