Greens branch out to prune diseased trees
Mumbai: The urban green warriors have been spurred into action following a spate of tree-falling mishaps;several housing societies as well as citizens have taken it upon themselves to inform the BMC about diseased trees in their areas and even to prune branches of trees.
At Kings Circle,the F (North) Citizens Federation has persuaded civic officials of the garden department to visit Lotlekar Marg in their locality where trees have reportedly not been pruned over the past 10 years.A member of the federation,Nikhil Desai,said,Branches of many of the old trees had withered and were on the verge of breaking,which could have led to a fatal accident.What was the BMC doing all this while Were they waiting for a tragedy to take place before taking any action Apparently,prompt action from the federation had earlier averted a major mishap.Once,late in the night,we spotted an old tree near Arora Theatre creaking and about to fall.The members immediately called up the local ward office following,which civic personnel went to the spot and cut off the diseased branches, he said.
Residents of Bandra and Andheriwhich have recorded three tree-falling accidents in the past few monthshave started to chalk out an action plan to examine the green in the area.They will conduct the exercise along with BMC officials.At SVP Nagar in Andheri,citizens surveyed nearly 112 trees last month and found most of them sick.A majority of the trees along Janki Devi Road were diseased and needed to be trimmed immediately.We have made several requests but to no avail, said Anil Bhagve,a member of the SVP Road Residents Association.
The BMC gets around 150 applications a month from housing societies,asking for the nod to prune trees.But,while each ward has 20,000 trees,only a few societies get permission.Every month,around 30 applicants get the nod, said Niranjan Shetty,member of the civic bodys Tree Authority.