In a major greening drive, the non-governmental organisation Siruthuli, Rotary Club of Coimbatore Smart City and Spark Round Table 323 came together to inaugurate Hope Vanam at Ondipudur, Coimbatore on 10.87 acres of land provided by the Indian Railways. Thirty thousand saplings will be planted to create a forest on the space that is currently a dumping site for garbage and building debris.

Sponsor

Minal Jeswani from USA who has connections to Coimbatore has sponsored the ‘one crore’ project through the Rotary Club and Round Table. The clearing of the land, planting and growing the saplings will be executed by Siruthuli.

Afforestation Head of Siruthuli, V. Chandrasekar addressed the gathering of Rotarians, Round Tablers and Siruthuli members.

He explained, “We will plant the saplings in three phases using the Miyawaki method of five by five feet matrix.” The actual planting will commence in mid-June as the site has to be first, cleared, levelled and prepared.

Hope Vanam will be Siruthuli’s 11th Miyawaki project. The saplings will be of species endemic to the Western Ghats. It is also the first project to use public sewage water, that will be treated before watering the saplings. Because the water is so rich in nutrients, the saplings grow much faster, said Chandrasekar.

Aparna Sunku, secretary of Rotary Smart City, said the project was particularly significant as Smart City was not even a year old. “We are proud to be part of this greening drive that will create a green lung space for our city,” she said.

Also present at the launch were Manish M Vyas, president – Rotary Club of Smart City U. Sridhar, chairman of Spark Round Table 323, Ritane Pasricha, project convenor of the Table, B. Saravanan, chief co-ordinator of Siruthuli. R. Murugan, Senior Section Engineer - Railways and other senior members of Siruthuli.