Saturday, January 08, 2005

Ubiquitous Plastic

Have you noticed it? Its lying everyywhere you go, be it a gorgeous fort, a beautiful valley, virgin lands, etc etc. It's everywhere. It's litterred in various forms, be it wrappers (zarda wrappers), covers, bottles, cups, etc etc. People whereever they go, they leave their mark their with whatever plastic they have. They have to do it, otherwise their trip is not fruitful.

This act of leaving plastic is not just restricted to people who don't know the harmful effects of plastic to environment. Most of us who know the harmful effect do it, either knowingly or unknowingly do it. Oh well, some people just throw whatever they have in their hands, when they are done with it. Asking them to do drop the trash in the dust-bin, would be of no use. They would also come up with this question - "Do you know whether the trash in the dust-bin is going to be properly disposed ?".

10 Comments:

At 5:09 AM, Blogger Cogito said...

Good point dude. Its not just the Ignorant but also the "all-knowing " who do this. When I visited Himachal Pradesh , parts of it had a very strict prohibition on use of Plastics .It worked too.

Interestingly , I used to be part of Vishnu Sahasranama Choir while at School & College (When in Nanganallur) . We had a strict order that all prasadam would be distributed in Thonnai (Bio-degradable) and not in plastic covers. A small step makes a big difference .

 
At 1:46 AM, Blogger Sudarshan said...

It's really very annoying - once you start noticing it, that is. Seen the PSPL calendar's photo for January? Its a photo of Khajjiar, in Himachal Pradesh. The place has been called a 'Mini Switzerland'. Know why that photo is taken from such a distance, when a closer shot would've looked better? Because none of us (including Pankaj, the photographer) could find a clean enough spot in all those 3+ sq. km.s that wasn't littered with plastic bags of all kinds. Even that nice-looking pond in the centre of that photo was actually full of bags.
Way to to, @#&%ing junta! Keep ruining every place you go to, until it start looking like a slum!
Did you know some guys decided to clean up the trek route to the Valley of Flowers recently, and removed 200 TONNES of garbage from about 13 kms? They had to hire fricking *trucks* to get all that garbage out.

 
At 7:16 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

And the litter in trains? I just so hate it when people throw plastic cups/newspapers etc onto the tracks. Cant understand why they do not get down at the myriad stations and use the bins

~Pooja

 
At 12:59 PM, Blogger kaatss said...

Bottomline: People have to change. The concept of throwing trash in dustbins is just not there. Ranting and raving aint gonna solve the problem.

 
At 9:01 PM, Blogger Srihari SN said...

Arun,

Yes a lot of temples do give prasadam in Thonnai, and it sure helps in making a difference

Sud,

yes i happenned to hear about the cleaning trek, and also there have been expeditions to Mt Everest to clean up the trash thats left at the base camp

Pooja,

Most of the times, the bins that are provided in the trains are mostly full, and the people resort to throwing the thrash on the tracks, quite sad though

Karthi,

I will stop ranting now, but what i hear from nature people are that there has been a marked improvement, but a lot has to be done.

When i went to kodai last time, i saw this caption after the "Do not litter" - "Do not pee also" :)

http://photos1.blogger.com/img/123/1125/640/DSC01453.jpg

 
At 9:59 PM, Blogger Aditya said...

Agreed. But there is no material to substitute for plastic. It is light, strong, moldable and above all cheap. Tell me one material that has all these properties and you have a solution.

Yes, plastic is a problem for now. But technology might be able to curb that. We have bio-degradable plastic and I hope we can come up with something that can make the existing platic muck lying everywhere bio-degradable.

I think changing people's habit is not easy. Heck, had it been easy, we all would have kept our New Year resolutions every year! :)

Cheers
Aditya

 
At 1:52 AM, Blogger Sudarshan said...

Aditya,
The problem isnt the plastic - plastic is the same everywhere, but it's only in the Indian mentality to throw trash without worrying about the effect on the place. Surely you dont mean that its okay to be throwing newspapers around? :)
But I agree with Srihari that people are improving a bit nowadays... people who go on trekking trips tend to be more serious about cleanliness, because they're there for the view. The effect spreads from there. Having enough dustbins around will also help a lot - how hard can it be to have a little one on every corner?

 
At 9:05 AM, Blogger ILA (a) இளா said...

I know difference between UK and India, plastic is used more that indians using. Though both country in same category in usage, UK looks tidy becoz people use Dustbin properl, they will hold the papers and cups till they reach Dustbin, is it happening in our country like this, we throw whn we have wastages. Also we have to consider onething , we dont have enough dustbins, also govt. have to keep the dustbins where it is really needed. again this is mutally have to grow, let we see. one thing is sure, we are growing one side other side clean and tide is missing!:(

 
At 9:29 PM, Blogger Srihari SN said...

ILA

Very true, people who have gone out of the country should bring in the clean habits, and make our country a wonderful place to live in, im sure u will be doing this :)

AD

As sud said, i m not talking about the non-biodegradable issues of plastic, i m talking about the habit of littering plastic, wat im trying to tell is try and do ur job of collecting the trash and drop it in the dust bin, simple right ?

 
At 1:04 AM, Blogger Aditya said...

I agree to some extent that people can mend their habits of littering. Why I don't agree completely?

Firstly, you can't teach an old dog new tricks. I am not saying its impossible, but its the longer & tougher route. When only bio-degradable plastic is available, you can have a cleaner surrounding without changing people's habit.

Secondly, the idea of dustbins is valid only for populated areas like cities and town. If you have been to a remote village, you will notice that plastic is littered along roads and rail routes only (partly because the dustbins in trains/bus are too small). You walk away from the railway track and its plastic-free again. There are actually no people living there to clean up the mess left behind by people travelling.

Thirdly, you must realize that you need to enforce new habits (or rules). Take for example Singapore, where they whip your arse if you litter even a little bit. Policing Indian population (where basic security is a question of probability) and enforcing this rule is not easy.

 

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