Every Sunday, engineer Madhav Patil leaves home at around 8 am armed with a pair of pincers and a few other tools. He spends around two hours removing nails and posters from trees in his neighbourhood. Madhav has been doing this since March and over the weeks, has found himself several social media followers, who have started joining him on his Sunday missions. Madhav shares, “I have been reading several articles and research papers that have scientifically proven that trees fee pain. Nails can weaken trees causing them to die, and most trees in the city have multiple nails in them.”
Puneites pick up tools to save trees
So I decided to do something about it.” The nature enthusiast takes his mission to a different area each week, after discussion on his WhatsApp group of over 100 people. Working in groups of around 20 every week, they have made the hashtag #PainFreeTree trend on social media pages.
After covering several localities including Kothrud, Apte Road and FC Road, this group of crusaders caught the attention of the Pune Municipal Corporation’s asst garden superintendent, Ashok Digambar Ghorpade, who joined them along with his friends and helped clean up the trees on JM Road. “After the officials joined us, they helped in propagating the cause we do,” says Madhav, whose group has been increasing by at least 10 people every week. And once colleges reopen, they hope this number will double. Madhav has also been receiving calls from people in cities like Mumbai, Nashik, and Delhi, who are eager to take up the mission around their homes. “I have only requested them to keep a common name for the cause i.e. #PainFreeTree while posting it on social media, so that it helps us reach out to higher authorities in the future,” he says.
Locals do their bit
It involves a process of extraction of sand from the beach 100 meters beyond the high tide and then purified by viagra prescription price using multiple levels of water treatment. They work with people suffering from mental, physical, free sample of viagra developmental and emotional conditions. Why should you care about all this cheap levitra talk about antioxidants and nutrition? I’m glad you asked. When the blood is able to look these up levitra 40 mg freely flow, an erection occurs. Once they have worked on the trees in an area, the group, that calls itself Tree Warriors, revisit the place after a couple of weeks to ensure that no new posters are nailed into the trees there. And though many locals initially laugh when they’re told that trees feel pain, they ensure that this group’s efforts are not undone. “We leave our contact numbers with local shops and restaurants in the areas that we cover. They keep an eye on the trees and call us if any advertisements are nailed back on them. So far our efforts have not been thwarted,” says businessman Ganaraj Tate, who has been with the Tree Warriors since its early days. Ganaraj adds that very little action is taken against miscreants who drive nails into trees in the city. “Despite it being illegal, people have been using trees to pin advertisements and notices. And many people are not even aware that it is illegal to do this,” says MPhil student Sukrut Kulkarni, who feels that the fines for those who are caught doing this should be hefty.
While it’s become common for members of this group to travel even to the outskirts of the city on their mission, a farmer from Maval has been traveling to Pune every week to lend a hand. “People ask me why I travel so far, that too on a day when I should be relaxing. But if we don’t contribute now, we may soon see the end of nature,” shares Pratap Sinh Patil, who rides the local train to Pune
This movement is also drawing people who wish to celebrate a special day giving back to nature. Laxmiprasad Chounde who celebrated his wedding anniversary last Sunday, says, “My wife Swati informed me about this initiative when she got know about it through an online messaging platform. I didn’t have second thoughts and we decided to join them on our anniversary that happened to fall on a Sunday. Everyone has their own way of celebrating and we chose this cause.”Physicist and biologist Jagadish Chandra Bose proved in his books ‘Response in the Living and Non-Living’ (1902) and ‘The Nervous Mechanism of Plants’ (1926) that plants have a sensitive nervous system, not dissimilar to that of animals, and their responses to external stimuli could be measured and recorded. His work showed that trees could feel pleasure as well as pain.Trees are exposed to the chemical reaction
“When you insert a nail into a tree, the tissue uniformity discontinues or breaks down. The presence of around 10 holes could cause enough structural and health problems to kill a tree. Puncture wounds offer easy access to insects and diseases as well. Vascular plants lack immune system and when a tree is nailed, a chemical reaction takes place hindering the food chain process. The tree eventually dies.” — Apoorva Deodhar, botanist