Bengaluru lawyer turns car into ‘mini garden’ to drive home importance of greenery

Bengaluru lawyer turns car into ‘mini garden’ to drive home importance of greenery

Mangalore Today News Network

Bengaluru, Oct 09, 2019: In a bid to revive Bengaluru’s ’garden city’ identity, an advocate has turned the rooftop of his car to a garden. With asparagus and tulsi growing above his purple Tata Nano car, K Suresh zipping around the city has got many thinking.

 

Speaking to indianexpress.com, Suresh explained that he had met some of his friends and experts in the field of gardening, horticulture who initially thought the idea of having a garden on a car roof is "crazy and non-feasible".

"Even though I saw this as a citizen’s contribution towards embarking on a personal initiative to encourage greenery back to the Garden City, the initial reactions that I got were not positive," he recalled.

Suresh, an advocate in the High Court of Karnataka, then happened to meet Lingappa, a former gardener in Lalbagh during the Republic Day flower show in 2018. "He supported my idea and happily agreed to help me set up my dream garden atop my car," he said.

The garden was ready within a week on February 2, 2018. Since then, it has been an integral part of the car and his identity, Suresh said with a chuckle.

The advocate is now planning to file a public interest litigation, urging policymakers to encourage it among other citizens to create awareness on the benefits of having a car garden. "If the same is expanded to public transport buses and personal cars that run in Bengaluru, a patch of green atop them would contribute to a larger lung space than Cubbon Park or Lalbagh put together. What a movement would it turn out to be?" Suresh shed light on his dream.

Suresh also revealed that he spends not more than five minutes a day to maintain the garden. "Once in two months, I use organic fertilisers to ensure the plants get their required dose of nutrients. Else, watering the plants while washing the car is no sort of a task at all."

The garden attracts many onlookers on his daily commute from Chamarajpet to the court premises and inquiries are aplenty, Suresh added. "It is a pleasant experience to try explaining the concept to all those who come to me. On the other side, I haven’t seen even one doing the same which keeps me thinking," he said.

Originally from Agumbe, a high-altitude village in Shimoga district surrounded by the Western Ghats and rainforests, Suresh said the garden has stayed afresh even after his long journeys outside Bengaluru. "Even though I have clocked speeds of 100 kmph at highways, the plants have managed to stay perched on the carrier filled with red soil over a plastic sheet tied to the frame of the car carrier," he said.

The 15-square-feet garden, which cost the advocate around Rs 3500 for the initial set-up, zips through Bengaluru carrying a ’green food for thought’ for many.

Courtesy:Yahoo.com