Kashmir Tour ---- II

Election, poll results, New Year celebrations et al being all over, let me concentrate a bit on Kashmir my love. Kashmir is truly famous worldwide for some world renowned spots especially, Gulmarg, Pahalgam, Sonamarg, Dal Lake, Cheshma Shahi etc but the fact about Kashmir is that everything there whichever catches the eye is attractive; be it a river, hill side, a rock, a stone, a road or a small flowing stream. The crystal clear flowing water in small and big rivers everywhere makes everything attractive except some urban areas where pollution has taken its toll. One Kashmir attraction that I'm going to make a report of is the CHINAR, a huge tree hundreds of years old with leaves of the shape of human hand. It's not a single tree or just a few of them but thousands found everywhere especially in plains that create a scene around providing shade and shelter for lots of people and animals alike with its wide projection of heavy foliage like a huge umbrella quite unlike all big trees seen in Indian plains as none of them can be compared to a Chinar in its beauty. The strange thing about them is that all of them, in such large numbers have been planted exclusively all over by people hundreds of years before and taken care of as you do for your personal garden. Since it takes a lot of care to grow and in not less than half a centuty it can reach its desired height and projection and that's why it's very difficult to grow a Chinar now and that's also the reason that their number has tremondously decreased especially after the current crisis in Kashmir. The Chinar is a protected tree by law and consequent upon the prevailing deterioration in law and order much damage has been caused to it as lots of them were felled illegally for its precious wood.
Chinar is one of the main attractions in Kashmir and it's beauty reaches its peak when its leaves take a golden colour in autumn before falling on the ground. The whole atmosphere takes a golden hue as the bulk of Chinar leaves is so huge that everywhere you see the gold of these leaves scattered and consequently thousands of tourists come here to see the golden colour of the Chinar of Kashmir. Indira Gandhi, the late Prime miniter of India had come to see the golden colour of Chinar only a few days before she was assassinated by the bullet of his bodyguard----- (to be continued)