“I challenge plastic bottles” has gone viral. Fr. Davis Chiramel of Kidney Federation of India is happy that his challenge has caught on with the young and the old alike.
It was a video that he had posted on August 15 as part of an activity his group had taken up in a grama panchayat in Malappuram. The video asks people to take up the challenge of getting rid of plastic not just as part of waste management, but also to keep away diseases like cancer. A formal inauguration of the plastic bottle challenge will be held in Kottayam on October 2.
“We have been talking about the kind of damage caused to the environment by plastic and have been trying to teach people to segregate organic from inorganic waste for quite some time.
“But people are yet to make it happen in their lives, as it has always been considered the duty of government agencies,” said Fr. Chiramel. “Two weeks now, people have responded to my video with great enthusiasm. I asked for a volunteer for each district, and I got several. Schools, colleges, teachers, and voluntary organisations have all responded to the challenge,” he added. According to him, an idea can become a movement only when people take it up. “People are ready to be proactive. We only need to channelise their actions,” he observed.
Fr. Chiramel said people were rather unaware that there were plastic collection centres too. Even those who segregate waste at home do not know where to deposit inorganic waste, he added. Joining the plastic bottle challenge is All Kerala Scrap Merchants Association, which will be collecting plastic bottles. The members of the association have agreed to visit all participating schools and colleges to pick up collected plastic bottles.
Any organisation or individual can inform the district co-ordinators so that members of the association get to know about plastic bottle collection centres. “This challenge is just a small step towards waste management, and I am happy to learn that the response had been good so far,” said Fr. Chiramel.
The challenge has brought in enquiries from abroad too. There are people who are ready to set up recycling plants, he informed.
Fr. Chiramel’s post on Facebook also provides the telephone numbers of all district co-ordinators of the programme.
