Newly-planted trees uprooted on Rashid Minhas Road

After Karachi experienced the hottest day in April on Saturday, when the mercury rose to 43.6 degree Celsius, some newly planted trees were uprooted from Rashid Minhas Road’s green belt in front of a shopping mall.

The Karachi Metropolitan Corporation’s (KMC) Parks and Horticulture Department (P&HD) had planted saplings of the Tabebuia tree, which would have turned out to be shade providers along Rashid Minhas Road, in the searing heat of summer.

The corporation’s park department had kicked off its campaign to plant trees along five major thoroughfares of the city in February. The target is to plant more than 25,000 saplings and also to look after them. The KMC plans to plant different traditional, environment -friendly and seasonal trees under the campaign to make Karachi green.

Saplings of the Tabebuia tree had been planted four days ago with the assistance of the private sector and nongovernmental organisations. On Sunday, Director General (DG) Parks Taha Saleem tweeted, “Alas! I feel absolutely disgusted to report theft of Tabebuia planted three days ago on Rashid Minhas Road near Lucky One Mall and UBL Sports Complex. [An] FIR is being lodged and [we] would request citizens living nearby to watch this place as now we are again planting there from tomorrow.”

He further tweeted and sought assistance from the Lucky One Mall management in the investigation process. He shared that the patch of the green belt in front of the mall was being maintained by the mall’s management and they had security establishment there. “With CCTV footage it will become easy to identify the culprits.”

Tabebuia aren’t native trees but have spectacular flowers. Horticulturist Tofiq Pasha told The News that the Tabebuia planted on Rashid Minhas Road had a very pretty yellow flower. “These are medium-sized and relatively fast-growing trees,” he said.

Speaking to The News, Saleem said the tree plantation was part of the corporation’s campaign to beautify the city. Since February, he said, they had been planting trees on different roads and conducted a flower show as well. “Up till now we have planted more than 14,000 trees in the city,” he said, adding that they had documented and mapped each tree the corporation had planted.

The corporation plans to plant trees on the entire Rashid Minhas Road all the way from Nagan Chowrangi. The Tabebuia trees, he said, were donated by NGOs and were very expensive trees. A single tree, according to him, costs at least Rs800 to Rs900.

“When on Sunday morning, our gardeners went to water these trees, they were not there,” he said, adding that the purpose of tweeting about it was to mobilise the civil society and neighborhood.

He said his department only had gardeners and not law enforcers. The neighborhood and police should keep an eye on trees and must take good care of them, he added. An FIR, he said, was being lodged, while an application had already been submitted to the police station. The Lucky One Mall’s management couldn’t share their official version till the filing of this story.