Leaderspeak | Public Engagement
Clean India is people’s movement Any mission or movement cannot become successful unless people participate init proactively. Swachh Bharat Mission is that one mission of recent times that has impelled people to keep their surroundingsclean and feel proud. Many individual initiatives by the responsible citizens and groups of citizens have given inspiration to many others for keeping their cities, society, neighbourhoods clean
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veryone loves clean surroundings but we as citizens busy in our daily routine life hardly get time to do something about it. But no one hesitates in extending a helping hand to a running campaign for a good cause. Swachh Bharat Mission and people’s initiatives in this mission is a perfect example. People visiting India or Indians going abroad have been witnessing the stark difference between cleanliness standards of Indian cities and cities in developed countries. They always wanted to do something for making their cities, and country clean. The government’s initiative gives a push to this desire and people have acted positively. There are many inspirational personalities and groups of people who have brought about visible changes in the society with their initiatives and deeds.
Citizen Initiatives
The Akshar School in Guwahati, Assam accepts plastic waste as school fees. This way, the school authorities are not just teaching children about keeping the environment clean and plastic-free but also imbibing in them a habit of recycling from an early age. To reduce the usage of plastic waste, Ashwath Hegde from Bengaluru has come up with an innovative idea and launched a line of bags that takes less than 180 days to biodegrade and dissolve in water in a few seconds. These bags are similar to plastic bags but they are made from natural starch, vegetable
28 October 2020 | www.urbanupdate.in
oil derivatives, and vegetable waste. Another youngster from Hyderabad, Prashant Lingam is using plastic waste as a construction material for building houses. A Mumbai based NGO Mumbai Sustainability Centre (MSC) started ‘Safai Bank of India’ (SBI)in 2018. Through Safai Bank, the organization is reducing the load of millions of plastic wrappers reaching the city’s dumping grounds and landfills by collaborating with companies in recycling business. The concept of Safai Bank is so successful that many children have become ambassadors of this bank. A young girl from Gurgaon offers muffins to anyone who brings five multi-layer plastic wrappers and deposits with her. A citizen forum HSR Citizen Forum has developed a Composting Learning Centre – Swachagraha Kalika Kendra in
Bengaluru. This initiative is supported by the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP). It is visualized as a live learning centre for all kinds of composting. It houses most home and community composting solutions available in the market today and many DIY composting solutions as well. One of the BBMP parks in Sector 4 has been developed to make this happen. People from different cities and even countries have visited this learning centre for introducing similar composting in their Resident Welfare Associations (RWA). To provide a smart waste management solution working on SaaS (Software as a Service) model, Kabadiwala. com was developed by Anurag Asati, an engineer by profession. This platform is a doorstep service that works on organizing the waste sector for individual households to improve
