“We have decided to appoint private contractors to cut and prune very old and very heavy trees and branches,” said C B Rokade, Deputy Municipal Commissioner (Gardens & Recreation). “We plan to earmark trees which are very old or where the pruning activity will be dangerous for our workers and give it to private contractors for pruning or cutting. There are some trees which have very heavy or brittle branches and those need special expertise to be cut or pruned,” said Rokade.

According to an official, around 150-200 trees in every ward fall under that category.

At present the BMC has only three tree- cutting machines. “Usually atleast one machine is needed for every two wards. We plan to procure atleast 10 new tree-cutting machines within the next few weeks,” said Rokade.

There are about 2.5 lakh trees in the city. “On an average there are about 10,000 trees in every ward. The BMC can only cut or prune 30-50 trees in a day,” said Rokade.

The civic adminstration also plans to prune trees throughout the year and not just before the monsoon season. “To overcome the heavy workload, the BMC is planning to do the tree pruning activity on a routine basis,” Rokade added. Usually the BMC prunes or cuts trees from April to August before monsoon. “In these months, the workload is very heavy and as a result we are not able to complete the work,” said Rokade. As per the new norms, tree pruning or branch cutting for every tree should be done 2-3 times a year.