125-year-old Baobab tree crashes

Vadodara: It had been standing tall for more than 125 years now, even witnessing rise of the present urban concrete jungle. However, the Baobab tree in Subhanpura area, the only one of its species within city limits, couldn’t bear its own weight any more and came crashing down late on Monday night.
The 50-feet tall tree's girth was around 25 feet. The boundary wall of two bungalows located next to the tree got damaged along with a car. Fire brigade men rushed to the spot and removed the debris.
While a big branch of the African tree had broken in May this year, it had rung a warning bell among the local residents about its weak state. “The tree’s branches are very heavy and needs regular pruning. We had approached the Vadodara Municipal Corporation (VMC) asking them to prune the branches,” said Dr Jitendra Gavali of Community Science Centre.
Gavali, along with another resident, Hitarth Pandya, applied an organic paste on the tree to give it a healing touch. “But the tree had become heavy. Its trunk is hollow and so, it couldn’t take the weight of its big branches,” Gavali told TOI.
A local resident said that when the branch had broken in May, the residents had requested the civic body to bring it down. “But we were told that it's an old tree and can't be cut. Now, it fell down and caused so much damage.”
Another of its species in Padra is 950-years-old and the Baobab tree has been listed by the forest department as a heritage tree. The tree’s girth is about 90 feet and it probably stores nearly 50,000 litres of water inside.
Environment activists say that no one has idea how this African tree came to Gujarat but it is located in many other cities too.