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Express News Service
PARADIP: Five years back, Lunukula village under Kujang block of Jagatsinghpur district wore a barren look. It’s green cover had been robbed of by a series of natural disasters, and whatever remained was devoured by timber smugglers.
Today, the village - home to 2,000 people - has 500 varieties of trees. Lunukula got its gift of greenery from Jagatsinghpur’s Brukhya Manab (Forest Man) Amresh Naresh Samant who created a ‘gramya jungle’ (rural forest) in the village on three acres of land.
Samant started planting the trees in 2015.
“When I started this initiative at Lunukula, villagers were not aware of the importance of trees and the green cover. It took me some time to make them understand why planting trees is important to maintain the ecological balance. Today, they themselves take care of the trees”, says 46-year-old Samant, an engineer at Paradip Port Trust who is on a mission to create rural jungles across Jagatsinghpu