Why are so many trees falling in Mumbai?

On June 30, as heavy rains battered Mumbai, a 60-year-old peepul tree came crashing down on a school bus that had briefly stopped on Lane 11 near Chembur’s Diamond Garden.

As it collapsed on the bus roof, its trunk fell directly on Vihaan Srivastava, a Class 6 student of Universal School, who lived in the same lane and was about to alight at the next stop. Of the 13 students in the bus, four other students sustained injuries. But 11-year-old Vihaan died.

Six days later, 18-year-old Hasan Alam Syed died after a tree branch snapped and fell on his head in Aarey colony while he was on his motorcycle.

The next day, 63-year-old Yusuf Kundawala died after a large branch of Saptaparni tree collapsed over him in Kurla’s Naupada area. He was about to join the inauguration ceremony of his family’s new shop.

The three deaths occurred in a week when Mumbai received more than 300 mm of rain – almost an entire month’s rainfall.

The heavy rain came with an unprecedented number of tree falls.

On July 5, according to Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation, the city saw 523 cases of tree or branch falls – 50% higher than the figure it usually records for an entire year.

The next day, 428 trees fell, taking...

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