Chandigarh 5 June08
The depleting environment is generating concern and people living in small towns across the globe are busy doing their bit to hand over a clean and green habitat to the next generation. City Beautiful too is a part of this green brigade. A few years back, the concept of environment just raised few brows. However, the instances like melting icebergs, rising temperature, food crisis, extinction of animal species etc, have made the people conc e r n e d about the ecosystem. The cries about global warming are shaking the masses out of slumber and public outrage on environmental degradation is gaining momentum. The concern for ecosystem poured out recently when residents switched off lights during the Earth Hour and moved shoulderto-shoulder to get their anger registered against the illegal felling of trees. Initiating a drive to bring illegal tree felling in the city to the residents’ notice, Dr G a u r av Chhabra from an NGO, Humlog, said, “ T h e participation of localities has enhanced when it comes to environment related campaigns. The citizens have become active and more vocal on ecological issues. All they need is a platform.” Apart from rise in participation in various environment-related activities, the sale and borrowing of books, magazines and CDs is on a rise too. Pankaj P Singh, who runs a librarycum-bookstore, Browser, said, “The trend of buying books and environment-related CDs is heading north. Apart from individuals, even schools are buying such books in bulks to make students aware of our habitat.” To join some leading environmentalist group or NGO along with joining signature campaigns the residents are doing everything to send a loud and clear message that environment protection tops the priority lists.