The Green Awareness Day kickstarted with an award winning documentary named “Mahua Memoirs”. This documentary deals with the mining industry flourishing in the region of Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand at the cost of tribal communities. It evoked numerous emotions among the audience including amazement at the tribals’ love for the trees, flowers and fruits and how intelligently they lived on them most of the time.
The eco bazaar turned out to be a mini mela. There was a wide variety of eco products on display by various entrepreneurs and small scale businesses. Murali of ‘Mylapore’s Sunday Shandy’ peeled and dished out dices of sweet organic mango bits for the visitors to taste. “Farm mangoes may not look shiny yellow, but even the dullest looking ones are the greatest in taste”, he emphasised. The visitors seconded his views and bought kilos of mangoes.
The cute table top and indoor plants were displayed by Harith Tharang of T Nagar. The wide range of table top jewel plants in amazingly beautiful pots were awesome. They needed less of water and can even survice air conditioned atmosphere, the managers said.
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Mullaivanam who runs Tree Bank of India, brought in dozens of flowering plant saplings giving visitors free saplings to be planted at their homes. Youngsters from the neighbourhood, Shika and Sonu brought in homemade sponge cakes that
are devoid of chemical enhancers, that attracted the visitors.
There were stalls exhibiting the products made by DS Special Children Welfare Association of Virugambakkam and with areca plates, hand knitted cotton towels, eco friendly bags, diyas, mats and more.
Jungle jewels, as the name implies, had a vibrant array of jewellery made out of seeds and nature products. This evoked enthusiasm among the young people, who had keen interest to buy them.
Pon Ravichandran, who runs Alwarpet based Green Tree Homes and Ventures sponsored 50 T Shirts, that were put on sale at the campaign. The proceeds was used to gather funds for Namma Arcot Road projects.
Greenica Organic Store of Virugambakkam, run by Radha Masilamani had products like pulses, grains like brown rice, hand pound rice, oil and many more.
Amway stalls exhibited the variety of organic cleaning agents that are soft on skin and
machines, and on the soil.
Shobha Menon ,a managing trustee of Nizhal gave a brief talk on how we could promote tree culture in urban areas, create awareness of the role of trees, plant the right kind of trees and also stressed on the most important part- caring for trees, through collaborative efforts.She also spoke on “Free the Tree” Campaigns (FTCs). Nizhal is looking for volunteers from this side of the city who could participate in
various aspects of greening of this area, hold talks to sensitize residents, actively
plant indigenous saplings, conduct tree surveys and participate in tree walks.The members of Nizhal are available to assist in the green endeavours and facilitate programs.All that it requires is commitment and a couple of hours in a week.
A.M Malathi gave a powerpoint presentation and lecture on organic agriculture,terrace-farming and waste management,citing practical examples from her very own experience.She shared tips on growing a beautiful kitchen garden that may bestow upon us all the vegetables and fruits that could be easily grown albeit a little effort on our part. Preparing compost using ‘Kambha’-a garbage disposal pot was the main highlight of her lecture.She also fine tuned the audience’s knowledge on different ways of making the soil more fertile for plant growth. Reducing, Reusing and Recycling waste were the underlying principles that she stressed on.
Namma Arcot Road is extremely grateful to L.V.Prasad Studio and Academy for providing the venue, facilities and documentary ‘Mahua Memoirs’.
NAMMA ARCOT ROAD 