People
Darshan Singh and his Psalm of Trees
SARAH VANCE
Darshan Singh is a Sikh-Punjabi activist and environmentalist whose book, Psalm of Trees, has a distinct Bancroft (Ontario, Canada) connection.
“The late Rod Malloy planted the seeds of this book when he shared Jean Giono’s poem, The Man Who Planted Trees, with me,” said Darshan Singh. “I translated it into Punjabi and then continued writing and gathering resource materials into this compilation which has been published in both English and Pubjabi.”
The resulting Psalm of Trees is in its second edition, with the first 4,000 copies having already been distributed to each and every secondary school in Punjab. During a recent trip to Punjab, Darshan learned from the province’s educational authorities that an additional 3,000 copies have been requested for use in the primary and elementary schools.
Darshan Singh’s Psalm of Trees has become an important instructional resource for teachers and students with excerpts and diagrams being enlarged to make visual posters for school walls. This book, along with his activism, is changing the landscape of his Punjab province which is the subcontinent's primary agricultural region, supplying 60 per cent of the country’s fresh produce.
“The Punjab region was once forested, but that has evolved with agriculturalist practices,” said Darshan Singh. “Over the years it has since become a vast landscape of farms.”
But this is all changing. Through the publication of his book, awareness has spread throughout the region about the social, economic, cultural and environmental benefits of reforestation. And, through partnership with Punjab communities, he has taken his activism one step further, having been responsible for gathering the financial support and volunteers necessary to have replanted more than 10,000 trees throughout the province.
“We are using small plots of private and public land in parks, schools, places of worship, and provincially-owned properties,” he said. "Communities are taking ownership for these trees and taking great pride in their growth.”
Darshan and his wife, Surinder Kaur, are both retired educators who divide their time between Bird’s Creek in Ontario, Canada, and their home in Punjab.
“Bancroft residents including the late Rod Malloy, Dr. Satinder Singh and Dr. Jawahar Rawal have all been instrumental in funding and inspiring this project,” he adds.
But it is Darshan Singh who has made the greatest contribution to this project and, in doing so, has stepped outside of the cultural practices of Indian society.
“Male children are widely celebrated in Indian culture,” he explains. “And when a male child is born it is customary to celebrate this birth by devoting large sums of money to hosting a festival of friends and family, which is called the Lohri. When my grandson Siddharath was born, I chose instead to allocate these funds that would be typically spent on a Lohri, to financing this book and undertaking these many years of reforestation in service of my province,” explains Darshan Singh, who hopes to continue this work for many years to come.
“Many of India's social practices, including the privileging of sons, were grounded in economic reasons that are no longer relevant,” he says. “But there can remain a lapse between the physical conditions of mankind and the perceptions and customs which man continues to honour.”
Darshan Singh’s project is as much about changing these perceptions as it is about transforming the landscape of his province. He notes, for example, the tree planting being accomplished by the Bancroft Business Improvement Area along Bancroft’s downtown core of Hastings, Station and Bridge streets.
“Many Canadian cities, as far away as Vancouver and as close as Belleville, have made themselves destinations through the use of purposeful inner-city tree plantations,” he says. And his book, Psalm of Trees, which has been dedicated to his grandson Siddharath and his granddaughters Sherry and Suneet, is an important reminder that the gains made by tree planting are as much environmental as they are social.
[Courtesy: Bancroft This Week. Edited for sikhchic.com]
June 26, 2013