India, May 28 -- The Supreme Court on Wednesday decided to close contempt proceedings against Delhi Development Authority (DDA) and its officials for tree felling in Chhatarpur falling within southern ridge with the court taking a lenient view considering the larger objective being for expanding the road leading towards a multispecialty hospital.

Passing orders on a contempt petition filed by Delhi resident Bindu Kapurea seeking contempt action against then DDA vice chairman Subhashish Panda, a bench of justices Surya Kant and N Kotiswar Singh noted that "clearly DDA was in contempt for keeping the court in the dark about the trees already being felled when its application for tree felling was taken up by the court".

"The overarching pu...