Concerns over method to translocate trees on Bannerghatta Road

Amid rising concern over the procedure, the work to translocate 185 trees in Bannerghatta Road began on Tuesday to clear the space for the Gottigere-Nagawara Metro line under Phase 2.

On the first day, 15 trees have been preened and shifted to the IIMB campus. A private company did the preliminary work to dig up 25 trees with their roots tangled over water/sewage lines and cables.

S Prabhakaran, the managing director of Asian Landscapes, the company tasked with translocating the trees, said the trees had been lifted without any damage to utility lines and cables. "We'd give chemical treatment to the trees, including root hormones, before planting them on the IIMB campus," he added.

Environmentalist Vijay Nishath, better known as Tree Doctor, was concerned over the procedure adopted to translocate the trees. "The tree's root bole must be saved without even the slightest impact," he said. "I saw the root boles dragged on the road, which will reduce the chances of the trees surviving."

Nishath said bigger cranes must have been deployed to lift the trees without damage.

But Prabhakaran assured that the roots are not damaged.

"We've translocated nearly 10,000 trees with 80% success rate. We're sure that our success rate would be the same in this project," he said.