ISLAMABAD: As the sun edged closer to the horizon along the banks of Soan River on the outskirts of Islamabad, workers hurried to complete a delicate operation under the supervision of Anas Vahedy, a 51-year-old horticulture expert and environmental activist.
The operation was meant to relocate the five centuries-old banyan trees from the Armed Forces Institute of Cardiology (AFIC) in the twin city of Rawalpindi through cranes and excavators to make way for a new hospital block.
‘Save the Trees,’ a citizen-led volunteer network that rescues mature trees threatened by urban expansion in Pakistan, had identified 35 trees that were about to be cut down due to the Rawalpindi hospital’s expansion.
The volunteer group chose five banyans among these 35 trees for transplantation in Islamabad’s Defense Housing Authority (DHA) area, while the smaller trees were replanted at nearby locations in Rawalpindi during the three-day relocation effort that ended on Friday.
“A building is being built in the [AFIC] hospital. So, for all the trees that were coming to that place, we submitted and documented to the authorities that if we could make an effort to save these trees,” Vahedy told Arab News on Friday.
