Coimbatore: Even as water body restoration activities continue to gather momentum in Coimbatore creating awareness among the public, a larger section of the city continue to ignore their responsibility and use water bodies as dump yards, which was evident from a recent cleaning drive in Thudiyalur, here.
Coimbatore: Even as water body restoration activities continue to gather momentum in Coimbatore creating awareness among the public, a larger section of the city continue to ignore their responsibility and use water bodies as dump yards, which was evident from a recent cleaning drive in Thudiyalur, here.
A team of volunteers who took up cleaning a 350-feet stretch of the Raja Vaikkal canal between Thudiyalur and Kanuvai, collected more than one ton of plastic wastes, liquor bottles and other wastes during their cleaning drive. “We started cleaning this area two weeks ago and have followed up with more more cleaning, yesterday.
Having toiled there for three days, it is disheartening to see the irresponsibility of people who treat the canal nothing less than a dump yard,” said V Sathish Balaji, Managing Trustee of ‘Restoring Nature,’ which is a Coimbatore-based NGO. He further added that a majority of the waste that was collected from the canal were plastic, food waste dumped by local restaurants, broken ceramic tiles, fibre glass and broken toilet seats.
In an attempt to create awareness among the local residents, the team is also undertaking the cleaning drive manually without using any machines. “The first few 100 mts are very difficult as they are completely clogged. Yet, if we work manually, those who see it would be aware that their actions are polluting the environment and stop, hopefully. We believe they would also be more responsible in the future,” he added.
The team of volunteers have planned to continue with he cleaning drive up to Kanuvai, where the canal starts. The team is helped by members of the Chinnavedapatti Lake Restoration Team and the Coimbatore City Municipal Corporation, along with other volunteers. “We are planning to finish the cleaning work before the end of May, much before summer rains could start so that the water is channelled properly,” said Balaji.