PUNE: Temperatures in the city have been hovering around 40°C for the past few weeks, making it impossible for people to step out in the sun. However, senior citizens who have lived in Pune for more than four decades remember they barely needed fans even a few years back. However, today a fan is not enough to keep oneself cool and an airconditioner has become a huge necessity.Madhukar Pawar (75), a retired professor who came to the city almost 40 years ago, today needs an AC to sleep peacefully. But he remembers a time when the houses were as tall as the trees or even less."This ensured the houses remained under the shade. But today, buildings are much taller than trees and remain exposed to the sun, making it unbearable to stay without an AC or a cooler," he said. He also remembers that suburbs like Katraj, Aundh, Kothrud were like small villages, which had less population and more trees. This ensured there was breeze even during summers.Nirmal Mehta (76), a retired bank employee who has spent his life in Pune, said, "In the seventies, when I used to go to the bank on a bicycle, the tree canopies were so thick that sunlight hardly reached the ground. But today neither the canopies nor the pleasant weather exist."Back in the 1950s, Pune and Bengaluru were classified as "non-fan" stations, and fan was more a luxury than a necessity here, said Major General S C N Jatar (retd), of Sadashiv Peth. "These days it is impossible to even step outside during summer but then nobody stopped kids from playing in the sun," he said. Air Marshal Bhushan Gokhale (retd) recalls that during his days as a cadet at the National Defence Academy (NDA), there were no fans in rooms.Architect Avinash Sowani, who has studied the changing face of Pune, said it was a different world then. "There were more trees, less people and less traffic. There were 'wadas', traditional dwelling houses, that had thick walls and courtyards, which kept the houses cool," said the 61-year-old architect.He said the city has changed so much over the years that it has become impossible to recognise most areas. "Vitthalwadi on Sinhagad Road, which is on the bank of river Mutha, once had a beautiful landscape, which attracted a lot of artistes who sat on the banks to paint. Today, the green cover around the place has been torn to shreds. If this continues, temperature will increase more. We have evolved from a city that never needed fans to a city that cannot survive without ACs," he said. (With inputs from Neha Madaan and Sandip Dighe)

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