Doon colony turns 'Swachh'; becomes zero-waste zone

The residents of Kewal Vihar colony have set an example by making their homes and colony, a zero-waste zone. The colony recently has been adjudged as a model colony in cleanliness by the Doon Smart City Limited, and has been awarded the first prize in this category.

Dehradun:A number of schemes are being run in the entire country under the Swachh Bharat mission, residents of a colony in Dehradun have shown the way forward to everyone without any government help. Today, Kewal Vihar colony, in the Sahastradhara area of Dehradun has become a torchbearer of clean and beautiful areas in the country. People of this colony, without any Government help, are segregating their garbage and putting the same to use.

Giving strength to the cleanliness mission in the country, people of this colony segregate and organise wet and dry waste from their homes, and then convert it into compost. Not only this, but single-use plastic is also collected and is being used either for assisting road construction or is being sent to the Indian Petroleum Institute, for making diesel.

Ashish Garg, a resident of the Kewal Vihar Colony, tells that about a year and a half ago, he got inspired by the Swaach Bharat mission and went door to door to educate people of his colony to segregate dry and wet waste and then to convert it into compost. Not only this, but he also collected single used plastics from the colony, filled them into waste plastic bottles, and then the bottles were used as fortified bricks, for road construction purpose and as raw material for making diesel at the Indian Institute of Petroleum.

This effort of Ashish and his friends bore fruits, and today, hundreds of houses in the colony are not only successfully segregating and converting the dry and wet waste to compost, but also putting the plastic waste to better use.

Awarded first prize for cleanliness by Doon Smart City

The residents of Kewal Vihar colony have set an example by making their homes and colony, a zero-waste zone. The colony recently has been adjudged as a model colony in cleanliness by the Doon Smart City Limited and has been awarded the first prize in this category.

Talking to ETV Bharat, Ashish Garg told that, instead of finding faults in the system and Government officials, it is the duty of each and every citizen of the country to come forward and contribute in making the country a clean and much better place to live. This will lead the way to make the environment clean and conserve the planet too.

Instead of plastic use cloth bags

The efforts were taken up by the resident of Kewal Vihar to support the Swachh Bharat mission, by converting dry and wet waste to compost and putting single-use plastic to better use, is probably one of its kind in the country. The women of this colony, have made about 1,500 cloth bags from unused and old bedsheets and curtains. They have distributed these bags to the shopkeepers, vegetable vendors around their colony and other places.

The women of the colony told ETV Bharat, that they are also giving the work of making these cloth bags to women who can make this a way to earn their living too.