Madras Week: Banyans as frontispiece

Banyans trees several decades ago continue to serve as frontispieces to institutions in Chennai

The ‘clubbing’ banyans on Ethiraj Salai

On the pavement of Ethiraj Salai, on both sides of the gates at Presidency Club, stands a banyan tree like a tutelary deity. Together, these two banyans do conjure up dvarapalas watching over a place. With their free-ranging branches, they seem to form something approaching an arch over the entrance to the Club. And together, they make an arresting frontispiece to the Club.

One banyan is far older than the other.

Now, what caused the banyans to spring up where they have: Chance or intent? There is no conclusive evidence supporting either of the possible causes. They are unlikely to have found their patch as a result of any planting exercise by the Corporation eons ago. The species that dominate the greenery on the road are as removed from this grand representative of the ficus family as opel gems on Mars are from the sands on Akkarai beach.

There are voices supporting the notion that chance, helped by wind and probably a seed-dispersing beak too, could have brought them about, first one, and then the other.

The fact that each banyan got slotted into a different side of the gate is something to marvel at.

A behemoth on a pedestal at Pantheon Road