World Environment Day: A field day for Mumbai's environmentalists

Fighting morning malaise, Mumbaiites attended events organised on Friday to mark World Environment Day.

Fighting morning malaise, Mumbaiites attended events organised on Friday to mark World Environment Day.

One group commemorated the day by forgoing motorised transport and commuting to work by cycle. Mansi Sahu, co-founder of Studio POD at Matunga who participated in the Cycle2Work initiative by Smart Commute said that she was a part of this event last year too.

“Cycling to work is the best de-stresser for me. I often cycle to my office from Colaba. Honestly, it has been an experience worth sharing. My colleagues too have started following the regime.”

Greenline and RecyleKaro launched the “e-waste for Environmental conservation (e4)”, an e-waste collection and conservation drive which will continue till June 7.

“We intend to increase awareness on e-waste and collect e-waste for recycling. The proceeds of this campaign will be donated to Sahyadri Nisarga Mitra for vulture conservation activities,” said Savio Silveira, director of Greenline.

Biju Augustine, an environmentalist started his own plant nursery at Royal Palms Mainframe IT Park, Aarey Colony. “I will be starting a nursery for Indian fruit bearing trees like mango, badam, and jackfruit. The idea is to get wildlife in the area to come back to this land.”

Apart from events conducted by individuals and not-for-profit groups, the forest department at Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP) took up a drive to clean the forest of plastic waste.

“There were more than three hundred volunteers from BNP Runners Group - an association of citizens who use the park - Wilson College’s Nature Club who came together with SGNP authorities for the cause. We could collect up to 800kg of plastic and other waste materials,” said assistant conservator of forests, SGNP, Sachin Repal.

Elsie Gabriel, founder of Young Environment Programme conducted a seed collection drive and tree plantation drive at Powai. “More than three hundred and fifty people joined us. The exciting part was, this year we had asked people to get seeds of fruits they had consumed. More than a hundred jackfruit and mango trees were planted.”