The Parijaat tree

Sitting here in Barbanki, on the last day of this year reflecting on the year gone by, I could think of a hundred things. But the one eternally positive and exciting thing I came across this year was the Parijaat tree.

Had never heard of it till I landed here in barabanki, 44 km from lucknow to complete, hand over and close the 4 lucknow road projects of HCC which had been meandering for the last 5 years. 

When I had first heard of it from my staff, I though of it as a piece of nonsense. But out of curiosity, went there one day. 7 km from my camp on the two lane road with lush green paddy fields on both sides, I felt I was on way to see some silly tree in a village folklore.

And through the unkempt, unmaintained and generally ignored road I reached the place. Nothing to talk home about till I read this board.

Loosely translated this board by the district magistrate says as under.

This tree, which fulfills all wishes is also called kalptaru, kalpvriksh kalpdan etc.

As per the Puranas, (Ancient Indian epic text) when the gods and the demons churned the oceans, it was one of the 14 things that came out of the churning and the gods took it to the heavens.

The pandavas (of epic mahabhartha) during their last year of exile when they were supposed to live incognito, by the power of their meditation and prayers brought it to the earth and Arjuna, made a hole till the core of the earth (pataal) and planted this tree.

There is no other tree in the world like this. (This is a single tree of the species on earth) 

 The girth of this tree is 10 m wide and it flowers in the month of August (not every year, once in 5 years is what I heard.) The flower is white and on drying it becomes golden color.

Just seeing this tree gives a feeling of well-being.

So much for the display board. 

Still a feeling of slight disbelief and ridicule was there in me about what I was going to see by the nondescript look of the place.

I entered the premises and the tree was right in front of me.  I was awed, least to say.  Yes it was huge. 10m diameter is something that’s not too big to hear for us engineers. But to see a tree trunk 10 m diameter is something else. 

Just one word, WOW. And a feeling of mystique and all the mythology started coming to my mind. 

THE TREE

(Is it biology or something more specific? Hmm I think I had heard the word botany somewhere in my journey of life) 

In botanical terms, Parijaat is unique and has been kept in a special category, because it does not produce either its fruit or its seeds, neither can its branch cuttings can be planted to reproduce a second Parijaat tree. 

This is a unisex male tree, that there is no such tree anywhere else to be found. People some times do confuse some other trees with this one but it’s a fully established fact that this is the only one piece of its kind as there are no seeds, and planting the stem cannot make the tree grow too. A unique 5000 yrs old living tree, that can’t reproduce in any way. 

Its flower is very beautiful and white in colour, on drying out it takes on golden tinge. (I have seen only the dried version, which I could get from the priest for a sum of rs. 300) This flower has five petals. This tree blossoms once in 5 years and that too a very few flowers at a time as the priest told me to justify that even for me he was charging this sum, (being the top official of the biggest company project in the 50km radius has its own recognition value) He also told me that the age of this tree is 5000 years. 

MYTHOLOGY

It was on returning back to my camp office that I started to find out more about the place I was living in. 

Till that day the place had held no special value for me other than just another project office. I had two offices in this project, one here in Barabanki, where I spent major time and another in Ayodhya. 

Till the sight of the parijaat tree, the Ayodhya office always felt more holy, so to say. But it was to change. 

Parijaat is referred to in several Hindu scriptures. like Bhagavata Purana, the Mahabharata and the Vishnu Purana.

All these refer to the incident that this was one of the 14 things that came out in the churning of the oceans undertaken by the gods and the demons and the gods took it and planted in lord Indra’s garden.

One version has it that lord krishna’s wife satyabhama was so impressed with the tree that she wanted it for herself and rukmini too wanted it coz the flowers were so lovely. They wanted it so bad that lord Krishna was forced to steal it from Indra’s garden. While he was stealing a branch of it, Indra saw it and since Krishna was a avatar of lord Vishnu and couldn’t be cursed, indra cursed the branch that it could not reproduce in any form, from seeds, from branch etc. hence it became a fruitless unique tree which could not be regrown.

Lord Krishna then planted it in barabanki, the wives garden. The tree was planted in satyabhama’s garden in such a way that the flowers always fell in rukmini’s garden.

As per another mythology, The pandavas during their last year of exile when they were supposed to live incognito, by the power of their meditation and prayers brought it to the earth and Arjuna, made a hole till the core of the earth (pataal) and planted this tree. And kunti used to pray to lord shiva with this flower. The exact village where this tree is located is called kintur may be for this reason.

AND THIS ONE FOR THE GOVERNMENT.

Can any government ignore and neglect such a valuable thing both from point of view of tourism ? such ignorance about the assists can only exist in this country and this place. request all you readers to do your bit in making this as widely known as possible so that more and more people can experience and see their unique tree in terms of  science, history, and mythology. after all you don't come across a 5000 yrs old living tree every now and then. lets popularize this and hope and pray that one day it shall find its place on the world's tourism map.