Patna Sep 02: With the message ‘save the trees, save our lungs’ Don Bosco student and a member of Tarumitra, Wartika Pandey, along with her teacher P C Thomas, returned from Malaysia after attending a five day Tunza International Children’s Conference organized by the UNEP.

More than 200 children with equal number of chaperones from 75 countries participated in the conference held at Putrajaua, Malaysia. This conference held  from August 26 to 30 with a pledge to protect the environment laid stress on reversing the rate of bio-diversity loss by the year 2010 . Wartika, a student of class VIII, was one of the two students chosen by the UN from India. She showed a PowerPoint presentation and delivered a  speech on the activities of Tarumitra in Bihar regarding the protection of environment, in addition to environmental problems facing India. Wartika stressed the need for banning plastic bags and using environment friendly bags, which could be recycled.

Excited about her performance at the conference, Wartika said, “It was  really a wonderful experience for me to represent environment problems of our country and raise issues like pollution, deforestation, garbage dumping etc among the children of 75 countries”. She wanted to spread the green message ‘each one, plant one’ among the children. Speaking about the conference Wartika asserted that it provide her a big platform for understanding the environmental problems in other parts of the world.

Thomas said, “The conference gave us an opportunity to know various environmental problems prevailing in different parts of the world. Some parts of the world are facing the problem of waste disposal in sea, which threatens marine life, an alarming situation for all of us. We also got to know about solutions and alternatives to protect our environment by using renewable sources of energy like solar energy, undertake forestation on a large scale and the like”.

Therefore the need was to raise awareness among children about importance of environment as they are the future of the country. Earlier Tarumitra delegates have attended the U.N conferences in England, USA and Japan. In 2008 the conference will be held in Stavanger, Norway.

Community Hall Inauguration

Call to save the Ozone Layer

Patna 17 Sep: World Ozone Day was celebrated here by the environmentalist groups. The Tarumitrites  held a massive demonstration on the roads in Patna City to highlight the ways to check vehicular pollution. ‘Kam Karo Bhai Kam Karo Vahan Pradusion Kam Karo’.,’ Eak Eak Paer lagainge Ozone Parat Bachainge’, ‘Duniawalo khed hai ozone parat main chhed hai’.These slogans echoed in the entire atmosphere when students came on the road. The rally started by plantation at Marvari Ucha Vidyalaya and went through the market to Mangel Talab. Over 1000 students from Rajkiya Ucha Vidyalaya, Guru Govind Singh Balika Ucha Vidyalaya, Panchshil Ucha Vidyalaya, Bhartia Vidya Mandir participated in this rally. 

Through Rally students tried to bring awareness among the people that air pollution is very disastrous for coming generations. Minister for Transport, Sri Ajit Kumar as the Chief Guest emphasized that the future of our nation rested in the hands of the children. They have to play a great role to create a pollution free society. The S.D.O Mr. Ajay Kumar and Tarumitra Staffs were also present at the venue next to Mangal lake.

Vehicles violating Euro norms

Digha 24 Sep: Out of 2000 vehicles in the state Capital, only five to seven percent maintains Euro-2 standard norms, while 50 percent Vikram autorikshaws and four wheelers create more pollution than the 65 per cent opacity norm.

Revealing this at a seminar held at the auditorium of Tarumitra Ashram, for the journalists of the capital, Chiranjeev Kumar, an environmentalist, said, “ Around 10 per cent vehicles running in the state Capital have already been discarded by some cities, like Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai and Lucknow. Twenty per cent of vehicles in Patna are even 15 years old,” he added.

People buy spurious petrol, a mixture of kerosene and hazardous solvent that is sold at different parts of the country.

The noted Canadian environmentalist-cum-journalist, Philip Carter, who was the chief guest, said that coal mining with foreign money in Jharkhand State was destroying and fragmenting large tracts of forest at a terrible cost to wild life, biodiversity and also to the tribals, who were being displaced. He also added that News Papers have to play a vital role because it is easiest and wider way to bring awareness among the masses. 

No Noise Pollution

Every festival should be celebrated in harmony with the nature and with the promise not to destroy the only mother earth.  Dipawali is the festival of light, where evil is conquered by goodness.  As today we are facing a number of natural disasters so it is the time to pledge to save our mother earth. Ghansyham Balika Ucha Vidyalaya brought out rally to aware people about the harmful affect of crackers not only on human being and animals but also to the plants. 

 The entire environment gets affected by the air and noise pollution. Tarumitra programme coordinator Kanchan Pathak said crackers produced air and noise pollution and also have bad effects on economy of any developing country. As a citizen of this country our responsibility is to protect our earth. On this occasion principal Gitanjali, teachers Anjali Mohan, Vina Varma, Shila Sarkar, Uma Shankar were also present there. Hundreds of students of the school pledged for no crackers.

Kurji 10 Nov: Trees are as precious as our lives. Tarumitra’s motto is to expand varieties of plants around us. No. of plantation programme is conducted under the banner of Tarumitra. To expand greenery around Patna Kurji Plantation took place on 4 of Nov. To make this programme more affective and to give proper information to the local public 25 students from Kamala Nehru School participated.  Around 100 plants were planted by these students. Sr. Roshani  of Kurji Holy Family Hospital, Fr. Robert, Kanchan Pathak, Rajesh, D.N.Prasad and Anuradha were also there.

In Patna City Guru Govind Singh School arranged plantation Programme on 28 Nov. Around 40 (Arjun, Putranjeevi, Ashok, Brahmi, kulanja etc) plants were planted to make school campus green.  Tarumitra volunteer Anuradha led the plantation. Near Patna Air port, Patna Nagar Nigam built a Medicinal Garden on 16 Dec under the care of Tarumitra. Tarumitra helped them by providing 70 plants.

West Bengal Convention

Asansol, Nov 1: Over 100 student delegates from various schools in West Bengal congregated at St. Patrick’s, Asansol for a period of three days. Students from Kolkata turned out to be the largest contingent. Six delegates from Patna under the leadership of Anshuman of Class 8, Don Bosco was chosen as the camp leader on the first day.

Bro. Frank Gale a wildlifer and an educationist played the host along with the school Principal Ms Seema Paul. They organized a memorable bonfire and earth dance for the gathering. The campers had outings, plantation programmes and several discussion groups. Sr. Prema SCC of Tarumitra core team coordinated the Convention.

Parasmani Shantiniketan

Kolkata 20 October 06: 10 students of Jesuit theologate Parsmani Shantiniketan visited Tarumitra Bio-reserve Patna. They stayed one week over there and spent time on Eco-theology. They discussed as how to vitalize a relationship between human beings and nature. They theologized as how the religions could motivate the humans to conserve and to protect the environment.The theology Students enjoyed the study tour in the company of many rare plants in the campus. They practiced Karmyoga and meditation everyday during their stay there.

Karnataka meet

Karnataka Dharwar 10 October: There was a Principals’ meet organized in Dharwar. 123 Principals from different Schools of Karnataka State participated in the meet. Subject of the meet was Environmental education in the schools. Fr. Robert and Sr. Prema sensitized the principals to Global environmental phenomena. They emphasized the need for outdoor activities and said that the students learn by doing. Nandita Jha, a Tarumitra member and a student of Mount Assisi sohool, Bhagalpur introduced Tarumitra activities to the meet. The Tarumitra team visited 3 schools in Dharwar, 7 school in Bangalore and 2 schools in Hubali and introduced Tarumitra in these schools.

Cluny family of schools organized plantation programme and rally for students as a follow up on the team. A memorandum on local environmental problems has also been submitted to the chief Minister of Karnataka by the students of these Schools.

Book fair 2006

This year a number of campaigns were inaugurated by Tarumitra in the book fair.   First one being the Bio- diversity Campaign- under this , varieties of medicinal and rare plants were kept for exhibition to promote its expansion. Tarumitra helped people to give more and more information about these plants.

C.N.G Campaign- This program aimed at reducing air pollution by promoting the use of C.N.G. and discarding the use of the harmful mixed fuels. It was very encouraging to see the involment of people who promoted C.N.G in Patna by putting their signature. Around 3000 signature were taken during book fair.

Save wetland campaign- Wetlands are heritage for a state. Recent reports show that 32 varieties of fishes have already vanished form the sea. It has resulted owing to the increase of the sea temperature due to the increasing use of chemicals in the factories and fields and their dumping into the sea.

Pesticide campaign- This campaign was held to reduce the uses of chemical fertilizer in the field for the production of grains. As people all know chemical fertilizers are harmful for the grains as well as those who feed on it.   1500 students from 36 schools, in Patna and near by school, participated to spearhead these campains. As always, this year also they cleaned the ground and charged those people who threw wrappers on the ground, by charging 3 Rs. as earth tax. Students also took out a rally to bring awareness among the people that earth is our mother we should have respect for her.

Edited By

Kanchan Pathak, Preety Konwar & Nivedita Jha