The Auto Driver in Tamil Nadu Who Spent Most Of His Earnings in Planting 1 Lakh+ Trees in 10 Years
For most people walking past the temple in Sangagiri, it was just another tree. But for N Palanisamy, the banyan beside it had shaded entire chapters of his life, from childhood afternoons spent playing under its canopy
A loss that changed everything
Palanisamy, now 55 and known locally as the 'tree driver' of Sangagiri, has spoken about how deeply the feeling affected him. The same year also brought the death of environmentalist Dr G Nammalvar, whose writings and radio talks on living in harmony with nature had shaped Palanisamy's thinking for years.
He had studied only up to Class 10, but Nammalvar's ideas stayed with him long after their one meeting. Losing both the tree and the man who inspired his outlook on nature within months of each other pushed him to act. He began planting saplings on the grounds of his old school that same year.
To fund this, Palanisamy used part of his daily earnings, roughly Rs 250, from driving an auto rickshaw. It was money he could have kept for his household, spent instead on seeds and saplings for a cause that offered him no income in return.
Planting is only half the job
Palanisamy soon learnt that putting a sapling in the ground was the easy part. Protective cages, bamboo supports, nets, and regular watering were what determined whether a young tree survived cattle, weather, and neglect.
Much of his money went into this unglamorous maintenance work rather than the saplings themselves. His wife, Gomathi, stood by him through these early years, encouragement that he credits as essential to keeping the effort alive.
This instinct, that survival matters more than the act of planting, echoes a challenge that groups distributing free saplings across India, like an auto rickshaw driver in Kolhapur who has given away over 8,000 saplings, have also had to reckon with over the years.
From one man to a movement
Three years in, Palanisamy's persistence caught the attention of the Sangagiri Lorry Owners Association. When they offered help, he asked not for money but for protective cages, a request that led to a steady supply of cages and free water tankers for large-scale watering.
In 2016, friends and nature enthusiasts who had followed his work on Facebook and WhatsApp came together to form Pasumai Sangagiri, a volunteer group that has since grown to 25 active members.
Every Sunday, while much of the town rests, this group gathers at schools, roadsides, temples, and hospitals to water trees, clear weeds, and plant new saplings, an approach not unlike that of a Thane auto driver who has spent years watering roadside trees using cans carried in his rickshaw.
Even the pandemic could not stop the group entirely; when plantation drives paused, members turned to sanitising streets and residential areas instead.
The scale of a quiet, decade-long effort
Through a nursery Palanisamy runs, Pasumai Sangagiri has distributed more than 1 lakh saplings free of cost across Tamil Nadu. Volunteers have sown over 50,000 palm seeds along lakes, ponds, and irrigation canals, a method of low-maintenance greening similar to what has worked for a Pune resident who converted a parking lot into a free nursery over 25 years.
The group has also intervened to save mature trees marked for felling during development projects, carefully replanting around 10 large trees, some over 50 years old, using cranes and heavy equipment, and monitoring them until they recovered.
At Vadugapatti and Sangagiri Model School, campuses that were once bare now stand transformed by the group's efforts, a shift that mirrors what environmentalists devoted to protecting ancient trees often describe as the deeper, generational value of a single surviving tree.
When asked about his biggest achievement, Palanisamy does not reach for numbers. He speaks instead of children eating fruit from trees he once protected as saplings, and of barren stretches now filled with greenery. More than a decade after losing a banyan tree that shaped his childhood, his Sunday afternoons still belong to the trees he continues to grow.
Images courtesy of TNIE
Source:
'Meet N Palanisamy, the tree driver of Tamil Nadu's Sangagiri': by Sneha Sivashanmugam for The New Indian Express, Published on 5 July 2026
Source: The Better India
