Drive nails into the trees at your own peril, it’s illegal

The next time you see a tree in your locality being used as a free billboard, do not hesitate to call the nearest volunteer or Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) control room.

A team of volunteers, students and the BBMP is all geared up to rid trees of posters, billboards, nails and all form of advertisements. This is not all; strict action will be taken against the advertising agency and the company advertised.

One such initiative was seen on Wednesday at Jayanagar 4th and 9th Block. Over 20 MBA students from BMS Engineering College, NGOs like Vruksha, Satva and Hasiru Usiru, along with BBMP forest cell volunteers, BBMP deputy conservator of forests (DCF), BJP Yuva Morcha members, MLAs Vijay Kumar and Narendra Babu participated in the day-long affair. They covered over 500 trees and made a list of over 200 violators. While many students did it for the first time, the initiative helped in making people realise that their act was against rules for which they could be penalised.

BBMP DCF (south) M Puttaswamy said that the initiative started three months ago and they had now been able to almost clear trees of nails and posters in the west zone. Efforts are now being taken to do the same in Jayanagar and surrounding areas.

Apart from removing boards, nails and all forms of advertisements from trees, they have also issued notices to people concerned, based on the address on the advertisements. There have been apologies from many in the past stating they would not repeat the act and that they were unaware of the violation under the Tree Preservation Act and Bangalore Municipal Act. But despite warnings, some offenders have been repeating the mistake. They will now be penalised and according to rules, they’ll be slapped with a fine of Rs5,000 for each offence.

Nailing trees and harming them in any way is an offence under the Tree Preservation Act. Further, using tree for advertisement also amounts to offence under the Karnataka Municipal Act as using public space for advertising, free of cost, requires requisite permission from the concerned officials.

Puttaswamy said that citizens can participate in the drive and inform the officials. The identity of the informants will be not be divulged. Citizens can call up volunteers, BBMP control room or the concerned officer and immediate action will be taken.

Honorary wildlife warden, R Sharat Babu said that the campaign undertaken on Wednesday was a success and the next one will be done at Manyata Tech Park, Jayanagar and other areas based on the number of complaints received. The move is aimed at saving the trees from becoming diseased and week.

He said that various multinational companies, who are keen to undertake various corporate social responsibilities, are ironically the biggest violators. Thus, instead of planting a few saplings in far off places, they should first start caring for trees in their vicinity.

Rajesh Reddy, a student of BMS College, who participated in the campaign, said: “This is for the first time we have done this. Twenty of us went in a group around the block to remove the ads from trees trunks. We also educated the locals that their acts kills the trees. Details of the advertisers were collected and given to the BBMP officials. Apart from helping BBMP, we will do the same in our vicinity and also rope in more people. Our next drive is on Sunday in Jayanagar.”

Tejaswi Patil, faculty of MBA, BMS College of Engineering, said this was being done to make people aware that this causes pain to the trees. Further, it opens the tree to bacteria and fungus. It also causes problems to the micro-organisms in the tree.