As they compete to win a contest, young students find simple solutions to perennial problems

The south zonal-level civic fest organised by the Bala Janaagraha saw students displaying their civic awareness initiatives under the project 'our roads.'

The city-level winners competed to qualify for the national civic fest, to be held on February 11. The event has already witnessed participation from around 40,000 students from 536 schools across 25 cities in the country. The teams which qualified presented their ideas and initiatives undertaken in and around their schools for the betterment of the civic infrastructure and in order to raise awareness on civic rights and responsibilities.

The students have touched upon various issues such as illegal garbage disposal, shortage of potable drinking water, bad condition of roads and drainage problems.

The team from Oasis International school, Bengaluru, bagged the first prize while qualifying for the national fest. They were successful in meeting their local Councillor Elumalai to discuss the issues of pothole-ridden road, illegal dumping of garbage and parking issues.

Taliya Hakim, the team leader said: “We selected 250 meters of Pottery road and identified issues and then met officials such as BBMP Commissioner Manjunath Prasad. We presented our action plan and they took into consideration the work that had to be done.” A plan to redesign the slaughterhouse as well as the market located on the road has been taken up by the team. The team plans to convert the waste from the slaughterhouse into fuel and electricity to power the school canteen. They are scheduled to meet the BBMP commissioner and the Mayor very soon.

The runner-up team from Chinmaya Vidyalaya, Trivandrum, surveyed close to 50 houses on Kanjiyoorkonam, Kattakada Road as part of their civic project. They presented the grievances of the citizens in the form of pie charts. Issues such as lack of proper disposal of plastic, bad road and issues with KSRTC bus stop were presented. The team from B.B.M.P. High School, Herohalli, Bengaluru, was the second runner-up. The team has met the Corporator, MLA and the Mayor to discuss about issues faced by residents in Andrahalli, Peenya 2nd stage. The team managed to get the garbage cleared, drains cleared and also got a defunct drinking water plant back to working condition.

All the seven teams that had qualified presented interesting ideas and shared their success stories.