It was few years back, when I was just an adolescent. Even\nthen, I had a great liking for Palash. Early in the morning, I wondered on my\nbicycle with a bamboo basket, up and down the city lanes, just to catch a\nglimpse of an old Palash. Then, at last, I would find one and, take home\nbasketful of flowers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But that year, something had happened. Suddenly, a few of\nthe old Palash had vanished into nowhere. It took quite a long time to search\none. There was no concrete jungle this time, only a few hutments, a big well\nand a half-constructed base of a big commercial complex, which would soon\nsurpass the height of the Palash and may even compete with a richer colour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I jumped off my bicycle and ran towards the tree. My joy\nknew no bound. I picked up as many flowers as I could. But I couldn\u2019t gather\nenough to fill the basket even half. I stared up hopefully. But alas! It was so\nhigh I couldn\u2019t even climb there. I looked around to get some help. But there\nwas no one in sight. I seemed to be alone on the spot, as if totally isolated\nfrom the whole world. I also tried unsuccessfully to climb up. But in vain. I\njust sat beneath the Palash on a stone and thought about it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Just then he came. He was watching me from the moment I\nentered the scene, he told. He was curious as to what a girl like me was doing\nthere. He volunteered to climb up the tree and bring flowers for me. I was so\ndesperate for flowers, I had no choice but to say yes. He scaled the tree\nsmoothly and started throwing small and big bunches of flowers. Then, after my\nbasket was full, I asked him to come down, thanked him and went away\ncheerfully. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Then, this became my routine for a few days. Every morning\nI would come ringing the bell of my bicycle and he would appear out of nowhere\nand get a lot of flowers for me. This very characteristic of his increased my\naffection for him and I felt the feeling was mutual. He would leave all his\nwork and come forward with a broad smile to receive me. Then he would climb up\nthe Palash and I would gingerly gather the bunches thrown by him. We developed\nan intimate relationship, though I wondered what that would result in. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But one day, as I came ringing the bell, an elderly woman\napproached me. She looked gloomy and barely uttered few words. What I learnt\nfrom her was simply devastating. He was no more. In this big bad world, he was\nthe only one who cared to bring a handful of Palash for a small girl. And I was\nthe one responsible for his demise. He had a fragile heart and was warned not\nto climb. But out of his love for me, he never cared for his illness. He had\nclimbed up the Palash for countless times and that had resulted in a heart fail\nthat morning. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The woman, who was in her fifties, happened to be his wife. A grand old man who climbed up and down the tree to collect flowers \u2026 for me!!! But alas!!! What remains now is a sweet memory, the fragrance of which would keep my heart glowing and warm forever. <\/p>\n\n\n\n (The article was first published on March 18, 1993 in The Hitavad, Nagpur. )<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Nivedita Khandekar Come Vasant (the spring) and one remembers the flamboyant Palash (Butea monosperma, popular also as Tesu, Dhak or Flame of Forest). Though now-a-days its quite a rare tree … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":275,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-274","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-environmental-news","category-pictures-maps-visuals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=274"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":279,"href":"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274\/revisions\/279"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/275"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=274"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=274"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=274"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/niveditakhandekar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/IMG_0360-1024x768.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n