Bangalore: Citizens rise up to the cause of eco-friendliness

Bangalore, July 29: When the municipal authorities are not responding, take the situation in your hands! that is what the citizens of Bangalore are doing these days. Even as the government assured that the city stink will go away in 6 months, we have make peace with the

material strewn in the city till then. "Why not bring them to use?", says Satish Bakshi, a retired tax consultant.

"I have made several calls to the BBMP complaining about the sorry state of garbage dumping, but all my calls have gone unheeded. So I decided that I would do something about it on my own," said Bakshi.

Searching the internet, he knew what he had to do with the waste at home and outside. He built a homemade biodegradable gas factory that lights up his kitchen thrice a week. "It just took a capital of Rs 20,000, an old tyre and a water tank to construct the entire set-up," he said.

This eco-friendly solution solves three purposes-saves cooking gas (which is skyrocketing by the day), reduces littering, and saves environment.

He Brought Electricity Home

Bakshi is not the only one; meet N Devaraju who retired voluntarily as the chief engineer and head of the technical vigilance cell of BBMP. Being a highly-posted government official, he could have pulled a lot of strings to get a domestic power connection at Arkavathy layout, which had no infrastructure.

While the officials at Bescom were not helping much pertaining to mounting electricity bills, he decided to go the eco-friendly way and got his house solar-panelled.

He bought a solar panel of Rs 4.25 lakhs, along with batteries and inverters. Furthermore, he cut down on his electricity usage by using CFL and LED lights.The power generated by the panel is used for lights, fridge, television, mobile charging etc. However, it cannot heat up the geyser or pump water from the borewell. For this, Devaraju installed a gas cylinder in bathrooms and used tank water for water storage.

"It was a one-time investment for the solar panels. The cylinder also works out economically as it costs around Rs 900 a cylinder and we can use it for 3 months," said Devaraju.

Encouraging many more people to take to the roads of eco-friendliness, the likes of Devaraju and Satish have set an example for all of us to learn.

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