Miracle Tree

[Loki]

A 'sweet-tears-oozing' neem tree has been attracting thousands of devotees in Salempur Jattan village, near Ghanour, on the Punjab-Haryana border about 35 km from here.

The neem tree has become the centre of attraction since December 3 after some liquid started oozing from its branches.

The news spread like wild fire when the gurdwara sewadars tasted the liquid and found it 'sweet' and reportedly got relief from skin diseases and joint pains after drinking it.

Believing that the tree has some supernatural powers, devotees have started using the liquid as a medicine.

Besides this, members of the gurdwara management committee and the villagers have also been organising community kitchen (langars) and round-the-clock prayers in the gurdwara from the very first day.

The gurdwara management has even deployed sewadars to control the vehicular traffic on the road leading to the gurdwara besides providing parking space for the visitors on a piece of land nearby.

Believing the liquid to be a remedy for all diseases, the devotees have been using it for various diseases like joint pain, skin diseases, asthma and diabetes.

With the gradual increase in the number of devotees, the gurdwara management has hung two frying pans to collect the 'miraculous liquid' from the branches of the tree. Moreover, the liquid is being distributed among the devotees as prasad (holy water) after they pay obeisance in the gurdwara.

While talking to the Chandigarh Tribune, Mr Rattan Singh, a sewadar who was the first to notice the liquid dripping from a branch of the tree, claimed to have recovered from an old skin infection after applying some drops of the liquid.

"The quantity of the liquid increased gradually as the number of visitors went up day by day.

About six litre of the liquid has been oozing out of two branches in a day and the same is being distributed among the devotees as elixir," claimed Mr Amrik Singh, president of gurdwara management committee.

Mrs Savitri Devi, an elderly lady from Shekhpura village, believes, "Holy water is oozing from the tree which has been proving a remedy for every kind of ailments and diseases."

"Yeh sab wahe guru ki kirpa hai jo neem ke ped te amrit barsa rahya. (This all is due to grace of god that the Holy water is dripping from a neem tree)," she asserts.

A visit by this correspondent to the place revealed that some water-like substance was continuously dripping from two branches and the gurdwara management had put two pans for the collection of the sap along with white coloured froth.

The 'superstitious' people including ailing and suffering from skin diseases were thronging the gurdwara for the miraculous water.

According to botanists, there is no such phenomenon in which sap oozes out from a tree continuously for the entire day . People at religious places generally manipulate such things for their vested interests.

Dr M.L. Sharma, Head of the Botany Department of the Panjab University, says that the tree branch may have some infection and so sap was dripping from it. During healing mechanism, the sap extracts on wounds. The gurdwara management may have considered the sap as the holy water, he points out.