Bhubaneswar: Bakul Foundation celebrated Ganesh Puja differently for the seventh year, worshipping a living tree and using the festival to advocate a deeper cultural bond with nature.
Bakul volunteers used eco-friendly, natural and reused materials to transform a mature tree in front of the Bakul Library inside Biju Patnaik Park (Forest Park) into Shri Ganesh through artwork.
A painted coconut became a mouse, the vehicle of Shri Ganesh, while traditional winnowing trays (kulla) formed his ears. Reused pieces of thermocol were shaped into tusks, painted reused sunboard became the eyes, and the trunk of Ganesh was painted onto the trunk of the tree.
Ganesh was dressed in a pink dhoti and turban.
Unlike conventional idols, this Ganesh needs no immersion. The rains will gradually wash away the artwork in a natural visarjan, leaving the tree intact and preventing the addition of idol debris, paints and other materials to water bodies.
Bakul Foundation founder Sujit Mahapatra pointed to the scale of Ganesh Puja celebrations and the environmental implications of idol immersion.
“In 2025 alone, the recorded number of Ganesh Puja mandaps in Bhubaneswar was 369 — about twice the number of Durga Puja mandaps. And unlike Durga Puja, which is largely a community celebration, Ganesh Puja is also celebrated extensively in homes. This means that the actual number of idols being immersed is much larger than what the number of mandaps suggests,” he observed.
Mahapatra referred to the Odisha State Pollution Control Board (OSPCB) study titled ‘Impact of Idol Immersion during Ganesh Puja on Water Quality of Aquatic Bodies 2024’, which found that Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD) in an immersion pond reached 95 mg/L, against the cited permissible level of 3 mg/L. The OSPCB report cited Bakul Foundation’s Tree Ganesh initiative as an example of an eco-friendly celebration in Bhubaneswar.
For Bakul’s volunteers, Tree Ganesh is not just an alternative way of celebrating a festival but also rediscovering the ecological symbolism already embedded in the image of Ganesh.
Silicon University student Payal Mishra, who participated in her second Tree Ganesh Puja, said she loved the way Ganeshji was turned into a mascot for environmental conservation.
“Lord Ganesha, with an elephant head and human body, can be seen as a powerful symbol of the union of creation — the animal world and the human world. Moreover, the mouse as the vehicle of the elephant-headed God reminds us that the mightiest and the smallest all have an equal right to coexist in this world,” she said.
Bakul Foundation volunteer Sagarika Mohanty explained that the celebration is part of Bakul’s larger effort to build a cultural relationship between people and trees.
“Bakul has been promoting a cultural association with trees since 2009 because we realised that plantation for the sake of plantation can easily become tokenism. When people develop a personal and cultural relationship with trees — when they love, celebrate and even worship them — they are much more likely to plant, nurture and protect trees and forests,” she said.
Bakul Foundation aims to demonstrate through Tree Ganesh that tradition and environmental responsibility need not be in conflict. Instead, festivals can become powerful opportunities to revive older cultural relationships with nature while responding creatively to contemporary ecological challenges.
