The Rotaract Club of Coimbatore Ikons undertook a cleaning project ‘Saaf Bharat’ where five streets of R.S.Puram were cleaned by 25 members of the club along with 10 volunteers.

They cleaned the cracker waste thrown on the roads. They started at 6.30 am and went on for two hours.

Diwali, the festival of lights has turned into a festival of pollution because of the crackers. Crackers, apart from generating smoke, also add up to the wastes dumped. People burst crackers and the sanitary workers are left o toil every year to clear off the wastes.

A young team from the Rotaract Club of Coimbatore Ikons decided to clean the cracker wastes in their neighbourhood. The club is an active organization which takes up various social welfare activities. Most of the members of the club are students from various colleges in Coimbatore.

The club has tied up with other such organizations and has planned to take up sapling planting as well.

S.Sourabh Jain, Media Coordinator of the club spoke to The Covai Post, “All of those in the team involved are students. We got permission from the Corporation Commissioner before taking up this activity. We only targeted five streets of R.S.Puram because the man power we had was less.

We wanted to contribute a little to the Swach Bharat mission. Since yesterday was diwali, there are a lot of cracker wastes lying on the streets. The corporation workers do the cleaning but we wanted to support them from our end. This is the first time we are doing this activity for Diwali. We are planning to continue this every year. We are satisfied that we are doing something productive for society. The passersby on these roads also appreciated our work”.

The organization has also planned to collect excess sweets from houses so that they could give those at the orphanages and old age homes.

Manisha K Ranka, a student member of the club spoke to The Covai Post, “I am a Rotracter for the past two years. I have been involved in various activities of the club. This is a new initiative taken this year in order to keep our surroundings clean. We are also involved in various activities to educate girls and children. We are all happy doing such activities”.