For two years, Harshavardhan Nigam passed the Instrumentation Limited’s boundary wall on his way to his coaching institute in Vigyan Nagar and the garbage strewn near the wall and the stink emanating from it would disgust him.
It was then that the 18-year-old decided that if he cracks JEE Advanced 2017, he would clean the area. The results were recently declared and Harshavardhan scored All India Rank (AIR) 4534. He knew it then that it was time to fulfil his promise.
For the noble initiative, he roped in his two childhood friends — Harshit Nakra and Pragyam— and a cycling group.
“After cracking JEE Advanced 2017 on June 11, I sought help from municipal corporator of Kota Municipal Corporation Girriraj Mahawar in cleaning the garbage as a large number of coaching students and locals pass it every day,” said Harshavardhan.
Mahawar arranged for a water tanker and half a dozen sanitation workers. Together they cleaned up the garbage within four hours on Sunday morning.
Harshavardhan and his friends later painted the wall and made graffiti on it to beautify the place so that no one throws garbage in future. They bought the paints with their own savings. “My two friends and I saved around ₹4000 for last three months for cleaning and painting graffiti. Although I will leave Kota in the next few months after my admission to IIT, I thought this would be my gift to the coaching students and city inhabitants,” he said.
{{/usCountry}}Harshavardhan and his friends later painted the wall and made graffiti on it to beautify the place so that no one throws garbage in future. They bought the paints with their own savings. “My two friends and I saved around ₹4000 for last three months for cleaning and painting graffiti. Although I will leave Kota in the next few months after my admission to IIT, I thought this would be my gift to the coaching students and city inhabitants,” he said.
{{/usCountry}}“Harshavardhan’s endeavour is exemplary and inspirational. If every citizen thinks like him then Kota will really be a clean city,” Mahavar said.
Kota deputy mayor Sunita Vyas and Urban Improvement Trust, Kota, chairman, Ramkumar Mehta visited the place and appreciated the cleanliness drive.
While Mehta said that they will put up a fence so that people don’t dump garbage there, deputy mayor Sunita Vyas said that they will construct a public toilet on the spare land so that people don’t urinate in the open.