90-year-old tree ‘collapses’ with a whimper in Karachi

KARACHI: A 90-year-old tree on MA Jinnah Road, just opposite Nishat Cinema, collapsed on Sunday night.

Old trees fall due to the carpeting of roads around them because as a result their roots do not get oxygen and they become hollow from inside, claimed Karachi Metropolitan Corporation's parks and horticulture director Abdullah Mushtaque. At least eight feet diameter of land around such old trees should be left katcha to prevent them from falling, he said.



However, horticulturist Tofiq Pasha Mooraj did not rule out the possibility of human intervention in the collapse of the tree. The tree's stem at one edge, according to him, seemed to be axed with a chainsaw as on the other end the stem is very rough.

On Sunday, he recalled that the wind wasn't blowing at such a pace that a tree could fall. It is possible that someone axed the tree and waited for the weather to do the rest of the job, he said.

Upon contact, District South deputy commissioner Muhammad Rafique claimed he was not aware of the fallen tree. He said that he would look into the matter and will take action if someone had tried to axe it.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 18^th, 2017.