Green Needa, a voluntary organisation of Needamangalam engaged in promotion of tree sapling plantation and roof-top garden among residents, has decided to develop nandavanams in temples in Tiruvarur district, according to its coordinator M.Rajavelu.
The organisers approached the administrators of Santhanaramaswamy Temple at Needamangalam and sought their permission to allow them to raise a garden inside the temple a few months ago and succeeded.
While the administrators were happy that the garden would fulfil the temple’s requirement of flowers and other leaves needed for daily rituals, Green Needa members were elated that their aim to achieve 100% survival rate of saplings planted by them would be achieved since they were raised in a highly protected environment, Mr. Rajavelu said.
Further, a philanthropist had come forward to bear the cost involved in regular watering of the saplings by installing a drip irrigation facility linked to a water supply source in temple precincts. A group of regular visitors to the temple were roped in for maintenance of the garden once a week since March.
Encouraged by the growth of saplings planted at the temple, the organisation expressed its desire to set up nandavanams in about a dozen temples in the district and was likely to get permission from the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowment Department.
Meanwhile, Green Thanjavur Movement, which recently inked a memorandum of understanding with Tamil University in Thanjavur for developing greenery in about six acres of land on the latter’s premises, said it wished to promote sapling donation programme among patients returning home from hospitals after major surgery or successful treatments of ailments or after delivery.
Admitting that the cost involved in putting up tree guards and maintaining them till the sapling reached the required height to survive from cattle menace in public places and on roads had shot up in recent years, GTM president Radhika Michael said that earlier it used to cost around ₹250 to ₹300 per tree guard. Now, the cost had shot up to ₹750 or ₹800 per unit, and saving them from the clutches of anti-social elements had also become a problem.
