From 1 Sept, 2009 to 30 Sept, 2009, over a period of an entire month Yamuna Vigil Campaign was organized under Yamuna Jiye Abhiyan by Peace Institute in collaboration with Centre for Environment Education (MoEF). i-dream was also a proud partner of the campaign.
A very common behaviour exhibited by Delhites is throwing of puja samagri and other household stuff into the river Yamuna through any of the bridges over the river. People consider this as an act of virtue in accordance with their religious sentiments. This contributes significantly to the pollution in the river which is anyways suffering significantly from the burden to city’s industrial and domestic waste. The most polluted bridges are those at ITO, Hazrat Nizamuddin, Wazirabad and DND. Except DND, the other three bridges have barricades constructed by the PWD (MCD). However, people have made big holes in those barricades to fa
cilitate throwing of stuff into the river.Openings on the bridge made by people
Under the Yamuna Vigil Campaign, the Hazrat Nizamuddin bridge was chosen for the campaign being one of the most crowded and it was covered with our posters, banners informing people about the kind of damage being done to the river. The various organizers along with a number of volunteers and school students from several schools in Delhi used to stand daily covering the entire length on both sides of the bridge.
Our banners covering the openings on the bridge
School Students standing on the bridge
Several collections points were also set up along the bridge so as to encourage people not to throw the material into the river but deposit the same at those points. At the end of the day, the entire waste was segregated into plastic, paper and other organic material. All the organic material was sent for composting, the plastic was sent for recycling with CEE whereas for paper recycling, there was a tie-up with the Development Alternatives.
A man depositing his offering at the collection centre
Collections made during the day at one of the collection centres
Plastic waste sent for recycling
As a result of our month long campaign, PWD relented and they managed to send in their workers to repair the bridge. During the last day of the campaign, an experiment was conducted wherein none of our representatives were made to stand at the bridge or at any of the collection centres. It was heartening to see that 1 in every 4 Delhiite deposited their offering at the collection centre voluntarily. This clearly means that if given a choice, some people are certainly ready to contribute to not polluting the river.
However, at the same time it is also very sad to see the attitude of other people who consider throwing material into the river as a pious act. They fail to understand a very simple logic that the river Yamuna was given the godly status so that people will protect it and not make it dirty. But there are people who still think otherwise.
Though the campaign was just a small drop in the ocean, it certainly has made some impact into the minds of thousands of people passing the bridge daily. More so, it is also now clear that if we desire, we can actually take steps so as to protect our river. The learnings from the month long campaign would be compiled and send to Lt. Governor of Delhi and MCD and we certainly hope that in the times to come, steps would be taken to revive the river.
Most important thing, are we ready to shed our "Kya Farak Padta Hai" attitude. If yes, half of the problems would be solved automatically. As we say, Make your own Choice.
