Coimbatore-based CRI Group will have rain water harvesting programmes as a focus area for its Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) activities.
As part of this, the Group’s vice-chairman G. Soundararajan and president of Ladies Circle India Nidhi Gupta signed an agreement here on Saturday to put up rain water harvesting structures at 50 schools as a pilot project. The average cost of each structure will be ₹20,000 and it will be shared by the Group and the Ladies Circle.
Mr. Soundararajan, Ms. Gupta, and Poonam Bafna, CSR Convenor of the Ladies Circle India, told presspersons that the schools will be selected across the country and the project will be completed in a year. The rain water harvesting structure (Rain Tap) is designed to harvest the rooftop water. It has a filter that is easy to maintain and the water will go into a tank or sump. The filtered water can be used for drinking in the schools. About 25,000 units of this model of the rain water harvesting structure is already installed in many places in Gujarat. If the pilot project is successful, it will be taken up on a larger scale.
The CRI has also come out with pamphlets creating awareness on rain water harvesting and different methods to implement it. The pamphlet will be provided with 1.5 lakh pumpsets that it manufactures every month.
Mr. Soundararajan told The Hindu that the Group’s average annual allotment for CSR projects is ₹10 crore. It has a structured programme for sectors such as healthcare and education. Now, rain water harvesting will also be a focus area under its CSR initiatives.
The Group’s employees and dealers too are involved in CSR projects. For instance, the dealers have taken up construction of check dams and desilting of water bodies. CRI has adopted 16 schools here.
“We have asked them (Ladies Circle) to look at these schools too for the pilot project,” he added.
