Money grows on trees! Storm smashes courtyard tree and makes 85-year-old man overnight millionaire

BENGALURU: An 85-year-old resident of Malleshwaram has received an unexpected windfall of approximately ₹28 lakh. The payout came after a 40-year-old sandalwood tree in his courtyard was destroyed during heavy rains and subsequently purchased by a state government undertaking.

The resident, N.G. Kesari, had nurtured the tree after a seed randomly sprouted in his front yard about four decades ago. While he initially tended to it like any ordinary plant, he later recognised it was a valuable sandalwood tree and continued to care for it as it grew robustly over the years.

The situation took an unexpected turn during heavy rains and strong winds in June, when a large neighbouring tree was uprooted and crashed directly onto Kesari’s sandalwood tree, snapping it in half. Despair turned to surprise for Kesari, who initially viewed the destruction of the tree as a major loss, after he reported the incident to the Forest Department.

Forest Department officials inspected the spot and granted permission to transfer the wood to the government sandalwood depot in Mysuru. A formal assessment revealed that the fallen tree weighed approximately one metric ton. Following the evaluation, Karnataka Soaps and Detergents Limited purchased the sandalwood, and the authorities handed over around ₹28 lakh to Kesari based on the total weight of the timber.