World Nature Conservation Day: Youth usher green revolution with plantation drives
Youngsters are organising plantation drives and street plays to aware people, in Delhi-NCR, about nature conservation.
The residents of Delhi-NCR, especially the young, are ready to celebrate World Nature Conservation Day, today. From collecting seeds, making seed balls to digging pits and burying these seeds, they are doing it all to make the plantation drives a success.
“Temperatures are rising across the globe and with the green cover depleting, Delhi-NCR has also experienced the heat. We need more greenery to sustain. Thus, we are planting trees such as peepal, neem and harsingar,” says Manish Khurana, from a volunteer group, We Mean to Clean, which conducts plantation drives on weekends. They have planted 350 saplings in certain areas of Janakpuri, Vikaspuri, Keshav Puram and Rani Bagh. The group has also been clearing garbage that hampers the growth of plants.
The efforts of Rotary Club of Gurgaon Cosmopolitan have been unparalleled, too. “We plant trees between July and September, and have plans to plant at least 1,000 trees by March 2018. Our first drive was at a government school in Kanhai Village, where we gave a name to each tree and one child took responsibility of every sapling,” says Sarvesh Dutt, club secretary.
Inspired by the PM’s Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, two students from Gurgaon have initiated Swachh Chetna — aimed at spreading awareness on environment issues. The duo recently conducted a drive with the help of volunteers at the lawns of Qutab Minar Metro Station, and planted over 50 saplings. “Monsoon helps saplings grow faster because winter and summer months are too harsh for the plants,” says Saranya Das Sharma, a student of Shri Ram School. They are even planning to spread awareness by performing a nukkad natak (street play).
More than 170 students from Heritage School and over 20 students from Manas School, planted 340 saplings at the Aravalli Biodiversity Park recently. “We are trying our best to increase the green cover in Gurgaon. These trees will grow on the Aravalli Range and will prevent the hills from turning into a desert,” says, Aaliya Ganguly, a 10-year-old student. While residents of Tulip Society have planted 600 trees as part of their initiative — Harit Gurugram — a group of families from Suncity, Gurgaon are crusading the cause of nature conservation and recently buried 250 seed balls, in and around their society.
There’s no need for artificial purifiers if we plant sufficient trees, says an entrepreneur Anju Singh. “We, on an individual basis need to organise plantation drives. Whenever I see an empty space, I feel like growing a plant. I planted some neem saplings a few years back, which have grown into big trees now. For the seed balls, we usually use neem seeds since it’s a robust plant that can grow anywhere. We also use other seeds such as those of amrood (guava), peepal (fig) and bargad (banyan). We’ve already collected seeds for the next season and are drying them now,” adds Singh.
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