These days, the air at night has a strong jasmine-like fragrance, wafting up in the twilight and misty night. What the ‘devil’ could its source possibly be?
The overpowering fragrance last night reminded me of it when I was going for a meeting of my school alumni association to plan for the upcoming football tournament, quiz and Christmas dance.
Indeed, the fragrance emanated from the Satan’s Tree or Devil’s Tree, Alstonia scholaris, and its vernacular names in India are Shaitan ka pedd (in Hindi) and Satonn or Soitanachem zadd (in the Konkani language).
ABOUT DEVIL’S TREE
In India and Sri Lanka, the light-weight wood of the tree is used to make coffins so that it is easier to carry the dead for burial.
Its unmistakable fragrance can leave asthmatics gasping for breath during the starry nights from Dussehra to Christmas. We are in that period right now.
The white bunches of flowers, that resemble ixora or pentas bunches, add an eerie feel on moonlit nights in dark forested areas.
The fragrance of the nocturnal blooming flowers is only experienced at night – the dark period that we associate with the devil and ghosts. Death reminds us of the devil like no other event in life can.
The tribals of the Bastar region refuse to go near the tree at night, perhaps, because some of them might have been rendered breathless by respiratory allergies. Hence, the name ‘Devil’s Tree’ has stuck to it.
They say that the devil is in the details. The tree species, Alstonia scholars, is native to southern China, tropical Asia and Australasia and is known for its towering height. That gives a lot of wood, as timber, for making planks.
After winning the ‘Battle of Plassey’ at a place that got its name from the Palash tree, Butea monosperma, the British East India Company and the British colony of India established its roots in Bengal and the adjoining Indo-Gangetic plains.
The wood of the Alstonia was used to make classroom furniture and blackboards as also the sheath for lead pencils.
Europeans know it as the Scholar’s Tree, and Indians often saw the devil in the English education system that produced assembly-line workers and clerks for the colonialists. So, either way, the names are appropriate.
This name was in vogue even before the Vishwa-Bharati University began the tradition of offering one Alstonia leaf to each student at the annual convocation ceremony.
The tradition, since its institution in 1901, has been attributed to Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), who was the first Asian to receive the Nobel Prize.
Although it produces four shoots in each flush of growth, the tree generally grows to a height of about 40 m tall, with a single trunk that is branched only at the crown.
The leaves of the easy-to-grow Alstonia tree are glossy, and the tree is attractive even when without flowers.
This majestic tree can be found all over Goa, and two of them have been cut in the last few days in front of Mall de Goa (Porvorim) to widen the road in preparation for the elevated road, or viaduct, that is now under construction from Guirim to the Atal Sethu bridge.
Curious? If you want to smell the fragrance of the tree, head for the Head Post Office in the Sao Tome area of Panjim, and the Shah Jahan region of Kala Academy in Campal, Panjim – but only at night.
(The author is the former Chairman of the GCCI Agriculture Committee, CEO of Planter's Choice Pvt Ltd, Additional Director of OFAI and Garden Superintendent of Goa University, and has edited 18 books for Goa & Konkan)