Trees planted for investors’ summit wither, Huda continues plantation

Haryana Urban Development Authority (Huda) is busy planting ornamental trees that were procured to beautify the city before the Happening Haryana global investors’ summit. Many trees procured from Telangana ahead of the summit have been leftover.

Residents are critical of the tree planting as many ornamental plants that were planted ahead of the summit have withered due to irregular watering and lack of proper care.

Over 5,000 ornamental plants and trees were brought from Telangana ahead of the summit and planted at strategic places around Signature Tower Chowk, Atul Kataria Chowk, Gurgaon Expressway, Maharana Pratap Chowk and Iffco Chowk. The plants include ficus palms, juniperus thai, ficus panda, foxtail palm, triangular palms and table palms.

These ornamental trees, for which Huda and MCG spent around Rs.20 lakh, have dried up at many stretches due to insufficient supply of water.

However, Huda continues to plant trees along the Sector 17 median, despite not taking care of those planted earlier.

Residents say that these newly planted trees will not see the day and perish soon. Frequent commuters to the area said that they have not seen anyone watering the trees.

Residents said that around 20 ornamental trees planted around three days back are yet to be watered.

“I cannot see any point in planting these trees during the summer. I have never seen any tanker watering the trees,” Atul Gupta, a shop owner in the vicinity, said. HT also noticed that the soil had completely dried up and there was no sign of water.

Karan Sharma, who visits the area daily, said, “This (planting trees) is sheer waste of time and money. Plantation should be done in rainy season so that plants can survive.”

MCG officials said that they have no part in the recent plantation drive. “Huda is planting some trees though we requested them not to. They have their own ideas of carrying out work,” Rohit Yadav, joint commissioner of MCG, said.

Huda officials confirmed that they have planted fresh plants on the stretch and also planning to plant more trees soon.

“We are planting 40 new ornamental trees as we cannot store them in the nursery anymore. We can guarantee their survival for six months. We are watering the plants regularly and taking proper care of them,” VK Nirala, senior official at Huda, said.