Plant or Adopt a Tree

“The one who plants trees, knowing that he will never sit in their shade, has at least started to understand the meaning of life.”
– Rabindranath Tagore

In one of his blogs published on grhgraph.wordpress.com, Guy R Horst mentions – “One of the very first blogs I ever wrote was titled, “The true meaning of life is to plant trees under whose shade you do not expect to sit.” This quote was from a Canadian farmer named Nelson Henderson. Many years later, his grandson, Jason Henderson, contacted me and thanked me for helping to make the quote famous on the internet. Jason contacted me again recently and shared that he suspects his grandfather may have paraphrased the quote from Rabindranath Tagore, an Indian poet who died in 1941. Jason and I agreed that giving proper credit is always important, so I’m doing that with this new post.” Since the rest of his blog is about other matters, this is where I have closed the extract.

Axar believes planting trees is simply a good (even noble) act. A

An old Sanskrit shloka says it more graphically and purposefully-

अश्वत्थमेकं पिचुमन्दमेकं
न्यग्रोधमेकं दश चिञ्चिणीकान् ।
कपित्थबिल्वामलकत्रयं च
पञ्चाम्रमुप्त्वा नरकं न गच्छेत् ।।

“Whoever plants one Ashwattha (sacred fig, peepul) tree, a neem tree, a banyan tree (Vad, bargad), ten of the mimosa tribe of flowering trees, kapittha (wood apple tree), bilva (bael, stone apple), aamlak (the Indian gooseberry, aamla), and five mango trees need have no fear of hell.”

Another version of this shloka reads-

अश्वत्थमेकं पिचुमन्दमेकं
न्यग्रोधमेकं दश पुष्पजातीः।
द्वे द्वे तथा दाडिममातुलिंगे
पंचाम्ररोपी नरकं न याति।।

The middle two lines are changed here, to say, “plant ten different flowering trees, two pomegranate trees, two matulinga (Citron) trees.” The first 3 types of trees and 5 mango trees remain constant.

There are multiple versions of this shloka – advocating different types of trees, probably based on their geographical origin. The gist of the message, however, remains the same – plant trees, and you shall be saved from hell or, in other words – take care of the planet, and your spiritual future will be assuredly rewarding.

Axar, in collaboration with “Vasundhara Shashwat Jeevan Sanstha”, Pune, follows an engaging social gesture of planting just ONE tree representing each customer.

Axar has adopted 252 trees in the Baner Hills area in Pune, and the Vasundhara team ensures their survival by regularly watering and carefully raising them for the entire year. We do this in respect of every new and continuing client of the firm, for any one or more of our products they license.

Of course, we are happy to promote more tree planting and / or adoption. Please connect with our Support team should you wish to do this. Namaskaar!