SPECIES OF THE MONTH: MAY 2018

Kingdom : Plantae
Class       : Angiosperms
Division  : Dicotyledons
Order      : Rosales
Family    : Moraceae
Genus     : Ficus
Species   : Ficus benghalensis

When British soldiers hanged the Indian rebel Amar Shahid Bandhu Singh from a sacred fig tree in 1857, a legend was born. Local stories say the execution took seven attempts and that, when eventually Singh died, the tree began to bleed.
 
The public hanging took place in Gorakhpur in what is now the state of Uttar Pradesh. The tree, at which Bandhu Singh had worshipped the goddess Durga, was just one of many sacred fig trees the British used as gallows during their control of the subcontinent.
 
Many hundreds and perhaps thousands of local people died hanging from these trees – most commonly banyans (Ficus benghalensis) but also peepul trees (Ficus religiosa). Both are sacred to people of diverse faiths, especially Hindus, Buddhists and Jains. They are abodes of gods and symbols of life, fertility and knowledge.
 
Yet repeatedly, the British turned to these trees as gallows. In 1860, in Bareilly in Uttar Pradesh, they are said to have hanged 257 rebels from the branches of an individual banyan in a single day. These public executions were designed to not only punish but also to terrorise the local populace.
 
The executions were cruel spectacles. In 1857, after they hanged 144 rebels from the branches of a huge banyan in Kanpur, the British threw the corpses into the Ganges river. Other times, they prevented families of those executed from taking the bodies away. Instead, the bodies remained, decomposing in full public view.
 
After India gained its independence in 1947, it adopted the banyan as its national tree. Since then, memorials have been installed at several of the fig trees. Some of the trees are still alive today but others have fallen and are passing out of collective memory.

Courtesy: https://underthebanyan.com