In Cumilla, various advertisements and festoons are being nailed to the trees on both sides of highways and rural roads. This is hampering the normal growth of the trees as well as causing different species of trees to die prematurely.
Visiting in person it was seen that all kinds of festoons including tin sheet-made advertisements are nailed to the trees on both sides of Cumilla metropolitan and district roads.
This kind of advertisement is being done by various companies or institutions including diagnostic centers, coaching centres, bank-insurance companies and other business institutes.
At the corners of the densely populated areas of Cumilla town trees of all kinds are entirely covered with advertisements of rental houses, doctors’ chambers, hospitals and politicians’ campaigns strung brutally with nails. As a result, hundreds of nails are getting into the trees before the trees are fully mature.
Deputy Controller of Examinations at Comilla Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education Md Shahidul Islam said, trees have life which Scientist Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose discovered a long time ago. The tree hurts but it remains unseen. Like animals trees get born, they grow up and finally die.
In the extreme heat of the Bengali month of Boishakh, the soil cracks and the ground water level recedes from the tree roots. During the monsoon, trees absorb water and as a result the bark of the tree increases in size. However, the nails stuck inside of the tree obstruct this process and cause severe wounds to the trees.
Shahidul Islam added that the nails reduce the growth power of the tree. Insects using the opportunity enter the tree and eat the soft core part. Thus the tree becomes weak on the inside and during storms many trees fall down.
Moreover, the nails hinder the tree's natural food collection process. The soft-stemmed tree’s gum peels off. The life force of the tree is lost. As a result, the tree is likely to die slowly, Shahidul added.
In order to protect the beauty and cleanliness of the city, the government passed a law in 2021 to regulate the writing on the walls and the installation of nailed posters on the trees. Due to non-implementation of this law, people are still nailing trees and using them like advertising booths.
If this law is implemented, the tree can get rid of nails. Civil society and tree lovers are seeking the administration's intervention to take legal action against those individuals or organizations that have put up signboards and advertisement on the stems of roadside trees.
In this regard, Cumilla City Corporation Mayor Monirul Haque Sakku said that necessary steps will be taken soon to increase the manpower to remove the advertisement banners of various organizations from the trees. Instructions will also be given so that no advertisements are nailed on roadside trees in future.
