Twenty-four-year-old student Lovepreet Singh said that many people are planting Eucalyptus, palm trees in Punjab during plantation drive but these are water intensive trees and hence one should understand which tree is suited for our state.
About 55 villagers from three villages of border district Ferozepur are on a mission to plant saplings of indigenous varieties of trees that were once upon a time found in Punjab. They also want migratory birds that used to visit these villages about a decade ago to return once there are ample trees for them.
Twenty-eight-year-old Har Ram Mohammad from Mehma village says that these trees still suit the climatic conditions in the state. “We are a group of 55 people from Mehma, Taraiwala and Rohranwala villages who part of a plantation drive along canals. Our organisation ‘Mera Punjab_1313’ works on the principles of Guru Nanak Devji who had stated that everything is yours (‘tera tera’). We are planting saplings of mango, jamun, sukhchain, neem, kikar, bohr, neem etc that are best suited in Punjab’s climatic conditions and once used to grow in abundance in the state but have now drastically reduced,” he said, adding that as trees were chopped to make space for development, new ones were never planted in its place. “Harrike Pattan located about 35 km from our village is home to thousands of migratory birds in winters and as a child, I spotted various Siberian birds in our villages. Now we are making efforts to bring them back,” he said.
Beant Singh, 34, said that so far they have planted over 600 saplings on the banks of Fazilka and Gang canals to prevent soil erosion. “In the past two years, we have planted around 350 saplings which are growing now..we take care of the plants as well as we want to see them fully grown trees, so we depute our team members to water these plants as well,” he said, adding that last year they planted trees within the villages and this year they are focusing near the canals.
Twenty-four-year-old student Lovepreet Singh said that many people are planting Eucalyptus, palm trees in Punjab during plantation drive but these are water intensive trees and hence one should understand which tree is suited for our state.
The team members are getting saplings free of cost from various nurseries and they are even cleaning the sides of canals before starting the plantation drive, he said, adding that people are also offering voluntary donations as well for the drive.
This initiative has come at a time when Punjab has only 3.67% of its area under forest. Neighbouring Haryana has 3.59% green cover, which is the lowest in the country.