‘Pandu Karanda’ tree removed

The Crudia Zeylanica (Pandu Karanda), an ancient tree in Daraluwa, Veyangoda that was protected amid protests from environmentalists, when authorities tried to remove it when planning the construction of the Expressway from Colombo to Kandy was removed by a group of people using backhoes yesterday, villagers said. The locals say that the tree is more than a hundred years old.

The locals further said that if the tree becomes an obstacle during the construction of the Expressway, it was planned to remove the tree from that place and plant it in another place.

Eyewitnesses say that a group of people who came in a lorry loaded with two backhoes removed the tree in a very short time and loaded it into the same lorry that came with the backhoes. Locals also state that a group of foreign and local nationals had come to remove the tree.