In Belagavi, axed trees spring up a campaign

Art for awareness

A view of the Vaccine Depot area in Belagavi. Photo by Shilpa Khadakbhavi

Vaccine depot tree

Belagavi artists

Gulmohar BAG- Belgaum artists group is exhibiting paintings titled ‘Portrait of a murdered tree’ on its Facebook page; the first image depicts a thriving tree and others represent the tree after it was felled.

Belagavi artists

Belagavi artists

Belagavi artists

Belagavi artists

Belagavi artists

Belagavi artists

In its heyday, the Vaccine Institute (Depot) located in Tilakwadi in Belagavi helped save thousands of lives by producing a vaccine against smallpox. Once a bulwark against infectious diseases, in the past few years, it seems like the area itself is in need of protection against those invading its green cover and smothering it in concrete.

Perturbed over the frequent disturbance to this urban forest patch, a group of artists under the aegis of Gulmohar BAG- Belgaum artists group, are exhibiting their paintings titled ‘Portrait of a murdered tree’ on their Facebook page.

Spread over 156 acres in the heart of Belagavi City, Vaccine Depot area is home to around 200 plant species including those endemic to the Western Ghats, 60 bird, 40 butterflies, 70 month, 15 amphibian and 12 reptile species. It has a natural drain, which is usually full during the rainy season.

A natural heritage of the city, it is one of the favourite spots of morning walkers, joggers, artists and botany enthusiasts.

Most of the people in south Belagavi have grown up frequenting this ‘mini forest’ and have fond memories associated with it. In March, artists of Gulmohar BAG had planned to visit this place every weekend and do a series of paintings reflecting its beauty. However, this plan was put on hold due to the Covid-19 lockdown.

Is it sustainable?

In the meantime, over 120 trees were cut down to promote ‘‘smart development" which caused great anguish to them.

In response to such ruthless felling of trees in Vaccine Depot and other parts of the city, the 18 artists came up with paintings in water colours, oil, pencil work and ballpoint pen work. Their work reflects the feelings and emotions of the trees axed.

Venting ire against such development, some people have also penned down some poems. “We are not against development. But development in Vaccine Depot area, which is being done at the stroke of a pen by ‘our leaders’ and those sitting in air-conditioned chambers, is destroying the natural habitat developed for over a century. If we fail to respect and protect environment, nature will take revenge in many forms just like the current health crisis. We want this jungle to be as it is and pass it on to posterity,” says Gulmohar BAG Founder Shirish Deshpande.

Artist Sachin Upadhye too echoed similar views and said that through their paintings, they want to send out a strong message that Vaccine Depot needs to be protected from the onslaught of ‘urbanisation’ and support of more people was needed in this effort.

This is not the first time that a campaign has been launched to save Vaccine Depot, an important lung space of the city. Even earlier, people had resented the proposal to set up the Suvarna Vidhan Soudha there. After that, there was a proposal to set up a botanical garden and a heritage park, comprising an art gallery, museum, glass house, fountain, food kiosks, gazebos, open-air theatre, zodiac garden and a botanical garden with medicinal herbs.

The work took off under the Smart City project and a few of them have been completed in the last five years. But the argument of environmentalists and local residents, is simple: why destroy a natural landscape to create an artificial one with manicured lawns and structures which require high maintenance?

They say that investing crores of rupees to attract tourists is not feasible and it is not too late to bring changes in the project.

“Vaccine Depot is currently being developed under the Smart City project. But even to this day, ecologists of the city are clueless about how the heritage park would be developed without disturbing the trees. Nothing is transparent here. Also, no formal assessment of biodiversity and tree population count in the area was done before taking up the works which means that there is no count of trees being chopped,” says Prof Rahul Prabhu Khanolkar, an ecologist.

Botanist S Y Prabhu said that Vaccine Depot is unique in that it has varied ecosystems like the grassland, riverine and the deciduous forest. Land records and the existing river ecosystem indicate that a stream flowed through it earlier.

Prabhu says that instead of developing a ‘modern’ tourist spot, the area should be converted into an education centre where people, especially children, can learn about different ecosystems, trees and understand the importance of the environment, which is more important now than ever.