KOLKATA: The Kolkata Municipal Corporation parks department has set a target of planting 50,000 saplings across the city by the end of October.
The civic body is already in possession of 25,000 saplings, which are being planted along major thoroughfares. The remaining 25,000 saplings would be bought from different districts in phases, said a KMC parks department official. "One of the primary reasons for the massive plantation drive is to ensure that when these saplings grow into full-grown trees, they protect our environment from pollution, especially that of air. We have launched a time-bound drive for the department and hope to wind it up in another three months," said a senior parks department official.
According to the plan, the KMC has chosen saplings of species like, debdaru, ashok, bakul, jarul, mahogany and neem, which will grow into tall trees but not with too wide a canopy. These will be planted along arterial roads. The parks department also plans to plant fruit-bearing trees at some of the parks and along canal-side roads.
A parks department official pointed out the selection of the roads, along which the sapling were being planted, were based on the areas' green cover. The department's experts and horticulturists have so far zeroed in on those arterial roads or thoroughfares, which have high traffic load but scanty green cover. Besides, some stretches are being given priority where trees had to be hacked to make way for the construction of real estate, civic or infrastructure projects.
"We have chosen Chittaranjan Avenue, APC Roy Road, CIT Road (Park Circus), Beliaghata Main Road, AJC Bose Road, Rashbehari Avenue and Asutosh Mukherjee Road, which not only take heavy traffic load but were also robbed of their greenery at some point to facilitate civic infrastructure projects," said a KMC parks department official.
Mentioning CIT Road (Park Circus) and Rashbehari Avenue, a parks department official said hundreds of full-grown trees along those two roads had been cut down for a widening project. "We need to make up for the loss of greenery there," said the official.
The civic department has also listed fruit-bearing trees, such as mango, jaamun, lychee, water apple (jamrul) and guava, to plant them at some of the big parks to attract birds there. Similar saplings would be planed along canal-side roads, said an official. "Wherever we planted fruit-bearing trees, the number of different species of birds went up. Tallah Park is an example," said a KMC official.
