Grow Growing Groaning

At this rate, one day the octopus will destroy itself and other places. Can we afford to to go on like this?

Text by Mandakini Khanna

“It does not concern me, I am least bothered!!” Is’nt this the attitude of the youth today? But it soon needs to be changed. Each of our metropolitan cities is turning into a huge, hungry, enormous, thirsty, monstrous octopus. Most of urban India is groaning under it’s own uncontrolled growth.

We produce mountains of garbage everyday, our factories and vehicles spew tonnes of dangerous smoke and soot into the air and we are busy making the rivers into drains by throwing muck into it. Our own Delhi has utilised nearly all its resources and thus is now reaching out its greedy arms to other rural areas and sucking their natural resources – rivers, forests, agricultural land, etc.

People from the villages are now being forced to come to cities due to the stealing of their resources by us. We people have a huge ecological footprint which extends far beyond our city’s limit. How many of us are even aware about our actions and their consequences, on us and others? We all want to live as ‘Maharajas in Taj Mahals’. We want to live a life of luxury. But is that actually possible or needed? There is nothing like a free lunch.

Coal for us comes from Bihar. Our water is now supplied by Bhagarati river in Tehri, wood comes from faraway Assam and now the octopus hands are ever spreading to other areas. At this rate, one day the octopus will destroy itself and also other places. Can we afford to go on like this ? Do we just scream HELP...or do we begin to take a close look at how we live and change our ways to make things better for us and all the other creatures who share our planet?

This issue has been produced by us children, or rather young Gobar Times reporters.We want to spread awareness about the environment and what damage we are doing to it.We share our experiences of the ecotours we went for in the capital city of Delhi, organised by the Environment Education Unit of the Centre for Science and Environment.

22nd April, 2000 was celebrated as the first Earth Day of the millennium. It is high time now that we and all the eco-friendly nations across the globe join hands and make the world a better place to live in ! So let’s pledge on the auspicious occasion of Earth Day to protect our Earth. Clean and save it from enemies like pollution. The Gobar Times Young Editorial Gang

Suffering from indigestion!

Text and drawing by Parth Gupta

Otto Julius Bierbaum (A sentimental journey by automobile: From Berlin to Sorrento and back to the Rhine), Munich, 1903

Backache: I have to bear the load of 11 million people and have to fulfill their needs too. This heavy load can crush anybody. Even a poor cow.

Iindigestion: I have 2 major stomachs — the ‘amir’ and the ‘garib’. Well, even though the rich are smaller in number than the poor, their consumption of resources is very high. Thus there is no balance and I suffers from indigestion.

Fodder

Hungry? The same am I, very hungry. My fellow cows (states) have to work hard to feed me. Won’t it be good if I went on a hunger strike? I have two major stomachs i.e. food consumers : the ‘rich’ and the ‘poor’. The rich eat a lot for their needs and greeds while on the other hand the poor barely get a chappati for themselves.

Water

Gut-Gut-Gut ! Isn’t that the way ‘I’ drink water? Hear that sound, it’s the water flowing in the wash basin. Now let’s tell you about that nala, Err…r, Yamuna... you must have seen on the way. It is the main source of water for me. Again comes the question of the biggest drunkard …. I mean the biggest consumer, and again, the rich are to be blamed. Those relaxable bathtubs with gallons of water in them have become a part of their life while the poor not only bathe in but even drink the water in which the rich have a nice time.

Fuel

I consume a lot of fuel too. Electricity is one of my basic needs. As I am ‘self-deficient’ I try to grab electricity from other states - making them suffer. The aim is not only electricity; the mission to consume petrol, diesel, etc. is also being accomplished. To tell you the truth, I have become habitual to luxury and I have a hell lot of cars and other vehicles – and for racing these cars on the road, I need a lot of petrol.

“Polluted Land”

Whenever you go to a vegetable market, you carry things in a polybag which is later thrown as waste. This polythene is nonbiodegradable and thus does not mix with soil and chokes it. All such inorganic matter that remains in the soil makes it suffer more and more. For providing more food for me, fertilisers and pesticides are used in excess which, in turn, pollute the land. ‘Can Gandhi kiss our soil today?’

“Waste Water”

The flowing water we talked about flows into the Yamuna and mixes with the dirty water to become dirtier. A lot of waste water like this flows into the Yamuna and all the chee-chee and su-su goes into the great river. The industries, too, are not lagging behind. Lots of chemicals and untreated wastes flow into the Yamuna. Don’t you think that all this makes the river water taste ‘good’.

“Exhaust Air”

The air is majorly affected by the exhaust gases released by the vehicles. Due to incomplete combustion of the fuel, gases like carbon monoxide are released which are hazardous my health.

Our Ecological Footprint

Think of your city as an ecosystem

For every kind of energy or matter we consume to maintain our lifestyles, some natural resource, somewhere, gets used up, and waste is produced. The city is an ecosystem, with inputs in the form of land, water, energy, food and materials from the hinterland which, after being utilised, become waste, the output.

The Ecological Footprint is a measure of the load imposed by a particular population or economy on nature. It represents the land (and water) area necessary to sustain current levels of resource consumption and waste discharge by that population. It is an accounting tool that allows us to estimate the resource consumption and waste assimilation requirements of a particular human population or economy in terms of corresponding productive land area. The Environment Education Unit of the Centre for

Science and Environment regularly organises ecotours for school students that focus on Delhi’s Ecological Footprint. The area affected by a Delhite’s lifestyle is not limited to the geographical boundaries of the city but his or her ecological footprint extends far beyond to distant places.

Whether it is water from the Himalayas, when we have exhausted our own supplies, or the increasing demand for mutton, which destroys the fragile grasslands of Rajasthan because of over-grazing, Delhi is a rapacious monster. Forests in states as far away as Madhya Pradesh and Assam meet the demand for firewood in Delhi. Four issues that touch upon nearly every problem, except energy and air pollution, that our city faces today, have been selected:

Waste Disposal: RAISING A STINK!
River Pollution: YAMUNA YUK RIDE
Water Harvesting: WATER WALK
The Delhi Ridge: JUNGLE JOG

The selection was made with the express purpose of explaining the twin concepts of the city as an ecosystem and the ecological footprint to students.

If we all lived like Americans, we would need two additional planet Earths to produce resources and absorb wastes ...and good planets are hard to find!

Over the years, we have lost the ability to use locally available resources in a sustainable manner. After polluting and depleting regional resources, we reach further to other people’s (temporary) surpluses. For example, the Yamuna, which supplies 70% of Delhi’s drinking water, is a stream of poison with indiscriminate dumping of raw industrial and domestic sewage. Today, our city faces a water crisis.

Groundwater sources are disappearing due to overexploitation, and the Yamuna isn’t fit to drink from. So dams like Tehri, which submerge forests and villages, are built. Ancient water harvesting structures such as those at Mehrauli, Hauz Khas and Anangpur, were once used to augment water supply, and after an age of neglect, are now being rediscovered as a part of the process of solving the water crisis.

The unique urban forest — the Delhi Ridge — which acts as a sink for carbon dioxide and serves to mitigate the burgeoning air pollution situation in Delhi, is vanishing before our very eyes. A visit to waste disposal sites brings us face to face with the wastefulness of our lifestyles. Visiting composting and recycling plants makes us look at garbage as a resource to be dealt with, rather than something useless to be dumped and forgotten until the crisis is too big to handle.

The Ecological Footprint Project

The objective of the City-as-an-Ecosystem ecotours is to widen the perspective of students towards their city’s environment and to sensitise them to the symbiotic relationship between a city, its inhabitants and the environment.

How a city functions as an ecosystem, consuming resources and producing waste. How it’s ‘ecological footprint’ extends beyond its limits and how it affects the environment. (See the Teachers Manual on these ecotours on the back page)

by Akshay Puri and Anubhooti Panda

But are you sure that the water you are drinking is as pure as it appears to be?

You must have had a stomach ache many a times. The reason ? The water you get is a (purified) form of the (drain) Yamuna. 70% of the water which we get in our homes is coming from the river Yamuna.

But as we’ve seen, the waters of the Yamuna are being polluted each and every day. You might get only a belly ache but there are many who even die drinking this water. Nothing can survive in its black waters. It has become a dead river.

Rivers in India are supposed to be sacred, yet we keep throwing our dirt and rubbish into them. We have no respect for our natural resources.

The river water has got several heavy and light metals in it. Many toxic and dangerous pesticides used in farms upstream of the river in Haryana and Punjab find their way into its waters...and we don’t have the technology to clean it up! High levels of DDT have been found in mother’s milk in Delhi.

Poisonous effluents from factories are carelessly poured into the river. Tonnes of untreated sewage are dumped into the river without a thought for the people downstream who depend on it. When we abuse the river, we abuse ourselves. Who pays for all those hospital and medical bills? We are willing to suffer from all kinds of illnesses but are not willing to do anything to clean up our rivers and land. We all are responsible for the condition of the river.

Ecotour: River Pullution

Yamuna Yuk Ride

A boat ride down the river Yamuna for a
first hand account on how polluted its
waters are and why.

Do we care? We care for water only when it is in short supply. Water is our birth right. If we want water, it is also our duty to conserve and clean it. A central government just can’t supply free water and run away from its responsibilities. It should give the people the right to make water clean and surplus. People have become dependent on the government. If they are allowed to make use of their brains, they may come out with brilliant ideas.

The Khilji King gave the responsibilities to his people to build and manage Hauz Khas, a water harvesting structure in Delhi. If people themselves develop new ideas and are allowed to manage their own affairs, they will be more successful in facing the water shortage problems facing them.

Catching rainwater

WATER — The basic necessity of every human. Suppose one fine day, you get up in the morning and find there is no water in your tap, how will you feel ? But this is a common feature of the people in the slums of Mehrauli who have taps but no water. In Mehrauli, there are a number of tanks in which the water is lying wasted.

No one is doing anything to recycle that water or to improve the condition of the tanks. Instead of improving the conditions of the tanks the MLAs are providing people with free underground water. Just for the sake of getting more and more votes they are doing this.

In the olden times, people were so sensible that they conserved the rain water in tanks and used that water directly, whereas, nowadays people are allowing the rain water which falls on their premises to drain and mix with the Yamuna river. When there is shortage of water, only this water will be purified and given to us.

So, what is the harm in using it before it blends in the river? However, I feel that we should adopt the techniques which the people at that time had. Then only we’ll be able to improve our present day situation. Oh! I want to tell you that don’t be dependent on the government, to follow these ideas. Remember, we are also a part of this city and we also have to do something to make it a better place to live in.

I, being a part of the environment, firmly believe that we will definitely be able to find a way by which there is no scarcity of water. I think Delhi has become one big, mean, selfish and thirsty octopus which drank all the water from its surroundings like Yamuna and underground to draw more water from here and there.

In simple words, it is becoming unsustainable. So, we should adopt the methods which were adopted by the people in the olden times. Why do people let the rain water drain, we must harvest water and conserve it properly.

Ecotour: Water Harvesting

Water Walk

Visiting traditional water harvesting
structures like stepwells and tanks
in the city of Delhi.
A lesson in environmental history.

A conversation with people in the slums of Mehrauli

A big tanker was standing over there from which people were getting water. The Delhi Jal Board supplied water to that tank. We went there and interacted with them about the problems which they face regarding water.

GT Reporter (GTR) — Who provides you this water ?

Tank driver (TD) — The Delhi Jal Board provides us this and it is the underground water.

GTR — How much water do you take out everyday ?

Tank driver — Well, that’s no problem. We can take as much as we want. But we carry about 12,000 to 14,000 litres.

GTR — Do you come everyday ?

TD — Yes, we come everyday.
(Then we talked to some people over there)

GTR — Who gives you this water and that too free of cost?

People — We went to the MLA, told him that there is no water in the tap. So, he said that he would give us free water.

GTR — Is this water clean ?

People — Yes, we haven’t faced any problems regarding water. It looks fine.

Hope in rain

During the Mughal period, people hoped for rain So, they made baolis with lot of strain Baolis served the people a lot A problem of water was sought

Then came the people and the pollution Again the problem of water and sanitation.

People started using their brains
Garbage went to the rivers and turned them to drains

Became clean the house and the surroundings
But over the years, flies started breeding.

The Yamuna is becoming a ‘nala’ day by day
Thinking their city is clean, the people are very gay

We have to take serious actions
Work must be done by fractions.

People must be made aware
Neatness and dirtiness both are our share

A little time is left with us
Must start our work without making a fuss

by Anubhooti Panda

Reduce Reuse Recycle

Have you ever wondered where does all the garbage and rubbish you produce go? For most of us it’s a case of ‘out of sight out of mind’. But our garbage is something we cannot wish away.We must learn to manage it.

Ecotour: Waste Disposal

Raising A Stink

Where does all your garbage go?
Visit to landfill sites, plastic recycling units,
sewage treatment plants and Sulabh.

One of Delhi’s serious problems is waste. Where do all the 7000 metric tonnes of garbage and waste that we throw away go? After we throw away garbage, we don’t know where it goes. Actually we don’t care about it. But do we know that it is this
garbage that further creates a problem for us. When we see garbage lying on streets or roadsides, we don’t feel good. We try to run away from it.

But have we ever thought that we are the actual contributors of this garbage? We are the ones who are dirtying our own environment. We ourselves don’t like living in dirty areas. If we continue to dirty our environment, one day we are the ones who will have to live in the dirt. None of us want that to happen. Do we? In order to avoid it, we have to start working from now itself. We have to take some action against this problem of disposing of waste.

Reduce, Reuse and recycle. This is what we have to do. The first word says ‘reduce’. We, the people of Delhi use more than we actually require. So we must reduce the amount of consumption of resources. The next is ‘reuse’. There are some things which are thrown away by us after they break. Some of these things can be repaired and used again. For example, if once a toaster stops working for some reason, it can be repaired and used again. This will also reduce the waste problem.

The last thing to remember is recycle. Used materials can be recycled to make other things. For example, used paper can be recycled. By following these three methods we can surely solve the problem of disposal of waste.

Text and drawing by Poornima Sheshadri

What a Waste

So much waste, such as vegetable peels, leftovers, is thrown away from our kitchens. In our gardens, the dead leaves fall off as waste. All this together constitutes 58% of the waste.
All the dust and ash contributes 18% of waste, metals — 0.6%, textiles — 4.1%, plastics — 2.0% and paper contributes 15% of it. Now we know where waste comes from.
Did you know that Delhi produces 7000 metric tons of garbage and waste everyday?!
Delhi has about 100,000 ragpickers who reduce the amount of garbage by 15-20%.
The amount of sewage produced daily is 2,270 million litres. Most of which flows into the Yamuna untreated.

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