BENGALURU: With the city fast losing its green cover to various projects, the residents of Sarjapur took it upon themselves to save a 45-year-old banyan tree. Had it not been for these Good Samaritans, the tree would have been axed to make way for a mosque. According to the residents, it was in the last week of April that they were informed that five trees would be fell to build a mosque. However, it was later decided that only one tree would be axed. The residents then told the officials who were involved in building the mosque that they would translocate the tree.
A citizen group, Voice of Sarjapur, started spreading the message that they would need crowdfunding to save the tree. To their delight, they managed to gather Rs 1 lakh by the second week of May.
However, the overall cost came up to Rs 2 lakh. “But since we had Rs 1 lakh, we went ahead with the work,” Deepanjali, member of Voice of Sarjapur, said and added that the contractor involved with the transplantation eventually reduced the cost.
It took about a week to prune the massive tree and on May 18 the soil around it was dug up. The tree was then taken on a trailer to St Philomena’s PU College in Handenahalli, 4km away from Sarjapur.“The roots were cut carefully. Medicine was applied to the roots and branches and a burlap cloth was wrapped around the root to hold the root ball. The entire tree was then wrapped with paddy straw,” Deepanjali said. Even the branches that were chopped were later planted near Chikkakere lake.
Besides transplanting the tree, the residents also took all the branches and planted them near Chikkakere lake. “We took 150 plus branches and planted it near the lake bed. Banyan trees can grow even from the branches with proper maintenance. We will take care of the these branches,” she added.
Saving every bit of the tree
The 30 feet tall banyan tree was pruned and cut down to 15 feet and then translocated to St. Philomena’s PU College in Handenahalli, 4km away from Sarjapur. The branches were all planted near Chikkakere lake.