Mantri teaks, 'teak-talk hein'

My wife says this is the season for  trees to green. But I would credit our security man Jayaram,  for the fresh leaves that are showing up on the two teak trees close to our sewage treatment plant (STP). Jayaram, posted on STP security duty, took special care to nurse back to life  the teaks that had been 'coffined in concrete'.. The Mantri project  civil engineers , while cement-flooring car wash space, left no space around the trees for watering them.. It took an agitation by some green-minded residents  to get the developers carve out from concreted floor some breathing space for the withering  teak trees.
Mantri Synergy,  a 750-unit residential complex on Chennai's OMR, has been raised on what was  till five  years back a mango and coconut farm. A tree count, taken when Mantri's took up the land for contruction in 2008,  tallied 24 mango, 140 teak and 165 coconut trees. Ms Snehal Mantri had then offered to transplant most of these trees on the periphery of our residential complex.
She did save many teak, some coconut and a lone mango tree, which still stands close to our clubhouse grocery stores. But Mantri's marketing minds, betraying supreme indifference to the sentiments of their own company boss, coffined in concrete two teak trees leaving little breathing space for them to survive. With concrete flooring covering the soil above their roots the teaks faced a slow death.
Two months back, Mantri project team slaughtered three of the surviving coconut trees to make way for parking space. A few of us, residents, held a memorial service for the fallen coconut trees; and announced 'a pickaxe action' to save the 'concereted' teaks. Our threat worked, and Mantri project staff dug up some circular space around the trees to facilitate watering.
Among participants at our memorial service to slain coconut trees were Mr R Vasudevan, Mr Jagadeesh Mahadevan, Mr Manoranjan Pandey, Mr Krishna, and Mr Sourav Mohanty.

Thank you, PropCare

Aadhya with one of the two teaks saved from slow death (see next photo)

Now that they have some breathing space, can we help the teaks recover from withering away ? "We can", says Munisamy of the Mantri Security staff who knows tree-care, and offers to nurse the trees back to health.
We need to thank PropCare - Sivakumar/Balaji - whose intervention spared us residents from taking up arms - a pickaxe to be precise - to undo the damage the Mantri project team had done to the teak at the car-wash bay near STP. When repeated plea to Mantri's for saving the two teaks fell on deaf ear volunteer-residents Memorial Service Group (MSG) announced a pickaxe stir to convey to Mantri's that we are capable of direct action. PropCare took the matter up with the project field staff to get them working on the teak trees. The work was done last evening.
What was planned as a protest move this morning turned out be an occasion for thanks-giving. It was also an occasion for our volunteer group to invite into our fold Sridhar(E Block). He shared his experience in residents community tree-planting in Pune, where Sridhar spent some time before moving to Chennai.Mr Sridhar also referred to Isha's Project GreenHands.

The group that met this morning.
The thing about trees is that they are unlike you and me. Trees don't blame people for letting them down. Maybe it was the weather that kept most of us indoors this morning - warm, and sultry.