Peepal trees on verges irk commuters

Rachna Khaira

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Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, April 21

Though peepal tree may be known to have great religious and medicinal significance, the fast-growing deciduous (only seasonal shedding of leaves) tree is definitely not the right choice for plantation on the central verges of various roads due to its big size. However, the Jalandhar Municipal Corporation, seemingly unaware of its qualities, has casually planted many saplings on central verges of various roads in the city.
The practice seems to be there for long, as in a majority of places, the saplings planted many years ago have now become full-grown trees, causing lot of nuisance to city commuters.
The situation is bad on roads like Mahavir Marg, Lyallpur Khalsa College flyover, Harnamdas Road, where new saplings
could be seen grown in line on the entire
centre verge.
At some places, the voluminous trees have even ripped apart central verges and have managed to go under roads, causing cracks on the top.
According to Subha Jain, a student, the problem has aggravated when, at some places, people have started worshipping these and have even built illegal structures in the name of religious places. “At one such tree on Harnamdas Road, people near the area have started worshipping it and slowly a priest also came up with an illegal structure underneath. Nowadays, it is a full-fledged worship place, which causes a lot
of nuisance on the road,” said Shubha. She also said that the situation
is acute in the morning as stray dogs, animals and even birds could be seen hovering around the “prashad” thrown by devotees.
Despite repeated attempts, Gurpreet Singh Khehra, Municipal Commissioner, was not available for comments, but as the MC is having just two staff members including an officer in the horticulture department, it actually needs to remove such abundant trees from the central verges.

Peepal trivia

• It’s amongst the oldest-known depicted trees. The first reference of this tree was found on a seal discovered at Mohenjo-daro, one of the major cities of the Indus Valley Civilisation, which shows peepal being worshiped. Remains of a peepal leaf-shaped well were also found in the excavation where once the ancient city stood.
• Peepal is one of the longest living trees, which is elaborated by the fact that the Shri Maha Bodhi tree, located in Bodh Gaya in the Indian state of Bihar, has a known planting date of 288 BCE. This is the oldest verified age of any angiosperm or flowering plant. As claimed by many, it was this very tree in Gaya under which Siddhartha Gautama, the founder of Buddhism, achieved enlightenment, or Bodhi, and came to be known as Gautama Buddha.