Residents of Sadayan Kuppam, a village located 2.5 km from Manali High Road, conducted an awareness programme on removing seemai karuvelam trees from their locality.
“All these years, we could not do farming as the seemai karuvelam trees were absorbing the moisture in the ground,” said Parasuraman, the village head.
The drive was led by members of Anandha Maargam Trust, a not-for-profit organisation.
A. Arul, auditor, started the programme with a talk on the impact of seemai karuvelam trees on the environment.
Members of Anandha Maargam Trust — M. Parthiban, Balaji, Chandru, Guru, Soundhar, M.Murugesan and K.Ganeshan — took part in the programme.
“The village is surrounded by many industrial units and many are unaware of the invasive nature of the tree,” said Arul, explaining why the campaign was initiated.
Members went to the playground where youngsters were playing and got them involved.
During the clean-up, the youngsters operated the JCB themselves to remove the weed. A number of saplings were planted at the place.
“We plan to visit the village every Sunday and check on these saplings,” said Arul.
