Residents of Belapur turn barren land into a garden

A barren land at Sector 9, Belapur, which had high-tension wires and was used as a dump yard, is now converted into an agro farm with a butterfly garden. The residents

A barren land at Sector 9, Belapur, which had high-tension wires and was used as a dump yard, is now converted into an agro farm with a butterfly garden. The residents of the area took charge of more than an acre of land six years ago. It is now home to 250 types of trees.

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About 20 residents took up the initiative of converting the land which is now called CBD Residents Agro garden. The number of residents participating has now increased to 100. They conduct workshops and activities for students and others in the park. Every alternate day the residents sell the produce grown organically in the garden, to people in the vicinity. This helps in funding the initiative further.

“We have row houses on one side and a hill on the other side. Because of the slope, there was heavy soil erosion. Our first step was to make the soil fertile. This was challenging because changing the nature of soil takes a lot of time,” said SN Pawnday, a resident and former captain of the Indian Navy.

Pawnday added that encroachments were coming up and the area was being used a dump yard. We have created a butterfly park there. “The idea for the agro garden came in as a mean to stop the encroachment. Volunteers from picked up all the waste without any external help.” “To maintain the fertility of the soil we let the weeds grow. This further helped us with the butterfly park,” said Suresh Bhagwat, botanist.