Karva Chauth with a green cause

LUCKNOW - Praying for longevity of your husband on Karva Chauth? Then why not plant a long-living tree after your husband? That’s what an NGO dedicated to the cause of environment is making married women do here.

NGO Sankalp Parivar is making married women plant saplings on Karva Chauth, and asking them to pray for tree-like long life for their husbands. Women in parts of North India observe a day-long fast on Karva Chauth, offering prayers to deity Gauri in the evening.

“The objective behind the exercise is to associate environment with traditional rituals, which in this case are the prayers on the occasion of Karva Chauth,” Sankalp Parivar president Anoop Mishra told IANS by telephone.

Sankalp Parivar is providing free-of-cost saplings to married women. For this, the NGO has also set up banks of saplings at various places in the city.

“As several trees are believed to survive for ages, women readily are taking away their saplings with a hope that their prayers would be answered and their husbands would attain the age of trees.”

“Frankly speaking, had it not been Karva Chauth, I am sure we would not have got a satisfactory response. I will again say it’s all because we have linked the trees with the tradition. In a country like ours, people even today are ready to follow a tradition as long as it is associated with prosperity and happiness of their family,” Mishra said.

According to the NGO officials, as many as 500 saplings were taken by women since Tuesday morning.

“Such an initiative is really praiseworthy. I came to know about the saplings from one of my neighbours. I feel every women observing Karva Chauth would like to plant a sapling in the name of her husband, hoping he would live long as the tree,” said Aunupma Chitranshi, a native of Chitragupt Nagar area here.