PMC commissioner agrees to form committee for Ramnadi rejuvenation project

Environmentalists working towards the restoration of the Ramnadi river under the aegis of Kirloskar Vasundhara, calling it the Ramnadi restoration mission have undertaken the challenge of improving the Ramanadi ecosystem

Environmentalists working towards the restoration of the Ramnadi river under the aegis of Kirloskar Vasundhara, calling it the Ramnadi restoration mission have undertaken the challenge of improving the Ramanadi ecosystem. The volunteers held a meeting with Pune municipal commissioner Vikram Kumar on Friday at the PMC headquarters who agreed in principle to form a committee for the rejuvenation project.

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MLA and BJP state chief Chandrakant Patil was also present and demanded that an independent committee be constituted for the revival of Ramnadi river as well as funds be made available for the development.

“It was a very detailed discussion with the commissioner as well as representatives of the NGO working on the revival of the Ramnadi river, along with mayor Murlidhar Mohol, city engineer Prashant Waghmare, standing committee chairman Hemant Rasne, leader of the house Ganesh Bidkar, superintendent engineer (construction) Yuvraj Deshmukh, where Patil demanded that a special committee be set up for looking after the Ramnadi restoration project, which has been accepted in principal by the PMC commissioner,” said Virendra Chitrav, director, Kirloskar Vasundhara International Film festival and coordinator Mission Ramnadi restoration project.

Kirloskar Vasundhara and 12 other organisations came together to create this mission of restoration of Ramnadi. The mission’s aim is to restore the river, nearest to its former state of continuous pure flow and to bring back the glory of this small and once beautiful river, which is 19.20 lm in length and originates from altitude of 950 meters near Khatapewadi at Jaraseshwar temple and flows through Bhukum, Bhugaon,Bavdhan, Pashan, Aundh and Baner.

In a map of 1890 of the Bavdhan area, Ramnadi is referred as river with an original width of 48 meters.

PMC commissioner Vikram Kumar said that he has approved the demand to prepare an independent development plan for Ramnadi and invite the representative of NGOs to be part of this special committee, with the mayor as the chairman. He also added that along with the revival of Ramnadi river, Mula-Mutha river will be developed, in which a separate development plan of ₹1,700 crore has been prepared for the beautification, depth and development of Mula-Mutha river.

Kirloskar Vasundhara has been working on the restoration of this river for the past two years and their work along with 12 NGOs, 33 colleges, 25 schools, and three grampanchyats have culminated into a bilingual book on the Ramnadi. called Ramnadi, the elusive river, this book will shed light upon the work on the restoration of the river, its history, geography, the challenges and the dangers that this river faces.