The next time you fling out that biscuit wrapper or bottle out of a train, watch out. Chances are that you could be caught on camera, littering the tracks. What comes later would be penal action.
The Southern Railway is cleaning up its act in accordance with the Swach Bharat Mission unveiled by President Pranab Mukherjee during his address to the houses of Parliament in June. The campaign will be launched on October 2 on the occasion of Gandhi Jayanti and will go on till 2019, when the nation celebrates the 150th birth anniversary of Gandhiji.
“On October 2, Railway staff and volunteers of different agencies will visit each station to supervise and participate in the cleaning activities of tracks and station premises. More than 3,000 volunteers will coordinate and participate in the cleaning operations,” says Sunil Bajpai, Divisional Railway Manager, Thiruvananthpuram Division, Southern Railway.
In addition, a novelty will be the ‘Tweet it clean’ campaign that exhorts rail users to join in the effort by tweeting to the authorities a picture of litter at any station that falls within the Division. “We will clean up the place, tweet out thanks and also tweet a picture of the place after it has been cleaned,” he adds.
Taking a leaf from the activities of the Ugly Indian in Bangalore (a group of volunteers in Bangalore who clean and beautify places filled with garbage and put up videos of the place before and after the clean up), which has gone viral, the Railways hope to encourage users to keep the tracks and stations clean by setting an example.
Sunil says users can tweet pictures of volunteers, tip the authorities about garbage dumping and also participate in the cleaning operations. The campaign comes to an end by 5 p.m. on the same day.
Prior to the official launch of the campaign the Railways has been on a drive to keep their premises tidy. He says there were instances when JCBs had to be used to clear the garbage dumped on the premises of stations. “Now whatever litter is there can be picked up and removed. In some instances, we caught the people dumping trash on camera and they were warned. Now, I have 90 cameras in Thiruvananthapuram Central and about the same number in Ernakulam. So, we have proof of those who litter the station. Ninety per cent of rails users are civic minded. The rest will have to be sensitised. Moreover, in small stations like Pettah, for instance, the volume of traffic is much less. So, obviously, the garbage cannot be generated by rail passengers or users alone. It is the same story in other stations along the 600km-plus Division,” he says.
Sunil hopes the initiative will sensitise rail users to the problem of littering and the problems created by trash. “Many of us tend to see the garbage but we ignore it and take it for granted. We hope this campaign will make users aware of the problem and make them see what constitutes the garbage that is dumped on railway premises and tracks. The remnants of coffee that is flung out of the window can create myriad problems. It is unsightly, yes, but, in addition it gives rise to several other issues that can affect the safety and comfort of train travellers. For instance, rodents that are attracted by the food can gnaw at the cables along the ground and compromise our communication channels,” he explains.
He feels that a lasting solution lies in identifying the reason for garbage piling up at every corner and sensitising and educating people on the need to keep public places clean and tidy.
“Poverty is not an excuse to be dirty. There are nations like Spain with high levels of unemployment and an economy that is not in good shape. But their cities do not have heaps of garbage on the road. If each of us put in place a plan to keep our country clean, it can be done. But that effort has to be made,” he asserts. And the Railways is on track!
How to Tweet it clean
1. With the picture that you tweet, include the hashtag #tvcdrive
2. Name of the station, eg. #pettah
3. Switch on location sharing in Twitter to help the Railways locate where you took the picture
4. Mention your friends in the tweet. Let them know what’s happening and invite them to join in too.
