Oct 09, 2008: TOI: Some Ngos & Citizens groups that have contributed to the well-being of Mumbai

The residents of the art deco buildings facing the Oval Maidan at Churchgate started the Oval-Cooperage Residents’ Association (OCRA) in 1978 with a motive to preserve the lush green open space popularly known as the Oval Maidan. A priority on OCRA’s agenda has always been to keep a watchful eye on the Oval Maidan and its surroundings. 

Moved by the July 2005 floods, YEPT began by researching on floods and found that plastic bags were also mostly responsible for clogging the drainage system and the Mithi river of our city. The Trust then launched the “Cloth bag revolution’ in the city and went from fishmarket to bastis to local pada market places to educate the citizens regarding using recycling materials. And at a second level they also launched school and college level interactive environmental science (which is now a compulsory subject by the boards) field trips learning method where students got EVS education outdoors at the lake site pollution spots or drainage systems or even rainwater harvesting sites to get a first-hand knowledge of the environmental issues plaguing the city. 

Since its inception in 1996, Hariyali, an NGO in Thane, has been working for the betterment of the environment. Their main activities are afforestation, water conservation and awareness. Interestingly they take the help of warkaris who walk to Pandharpur, by requesting them to plant the seeds on the way. In the first year, they planted 10 lakh trees and the graph started rising. The organisation has voluntary experts who guide the general public and raise awareness. Hariyali also works on conserving and storing rainwater with the help of experts. The organisation has also taken initiatives to clean the lakes and ponds in the vicinity. They are planning to transform their organisation into a leading institute for research and environmental sciences. And as Punam Singavi, the Founder of Hariyali says, “Good environment is a basic need.”

5) Action for Good Governance and Networking in India (AGNI)

AGNI is a voluntary movement meant to network citizen groups so as to create the democratic “numbers” that no political system can easily ignore. The city is served by 24 municipal wards. There is an AGNI JAAG in most of them. Centrally and through the JAAGs, citizens are empowered by the right information and helped to organise. The groups then act and dialogue with administrative and elected authorities. The emphasis is on creating and extending self-help networks. 
 

Karmayog is a new paradigm of how citizens can contribute to improving the world. Karmayog enables this at three levels. The first is at an individual level: where a citizen can get involved in any issue to the degree that he or she wants to and participate accordingly. The second is where groups of citizens and organisations come together on issues of common interest and work together and the third is where government (senior officers in various departments) can get citizens’ inputs for planning and improving policies, procedures and programmes. 
 

Citizens’ Unity Forum (CUF) is an association of 32 cooperative housing societies occupying about 650 families in Panvel. Established in 1999, the forum aims at forming a clean, beautiful, healthy and safe Panvel. Every year, the forum has been conducting different programs and takes many initiatives to inculcate civic sense among the residents. The result has been outstanding as today the whole stretch adjacent to Nityanand marg is renamed as CUF road and the locality is now popularly known as CUF nagar. The Forum has been consistently working towards maintaining the cleanliness of their locality and also keeping the residents united. 
   

The Vasant Vihar township in Thane (west) houses 3500 families residing in 40 registered societies. The township has many accolades to its name, the recent one being ‘Glory of Mumbai Awards’ by The Times of India for being the best township in Mumbai. What makes the township distinct is the interaction among the residents and the varied activities they conduct. Vasant Vihar is determined towards conservation of environment and optimum utilization of resources. They have installed rain water harvesting units that has improved the groundwater table has risen thereby improving the yield of the bore wells. One notable thing about the township is the greenery. In the whole locality, trees are planted along the roadside and there are many gardens in the premises along with a jogging track. What’s more? The township publishes an annual magazine called VIVA – a medium for residents to express themselves, and also lists the events conducted during the year.

9) Diamond Garden ALM

Conceptualised in July 1998 under the leadership of Mr. Rajkumar Sharma, the Diamond Garden ALM at Chembur started its journey as an ALM. The ALM members believe in helping the needy. It was the first ALM to start operation in Mumbai. Mr. Rajkumar Sharma says, “Since we were the first ALM, the BMC encouraged and helped us a lot because even they wanted many ALMs to come up. In fact many other ALMs across Mumbai have approached us for advice.” With the efforts of the members, the entire locality has been transformed into a clean and green locality. Over the years they have gathered funds and donated it to various organisations for the Mumbai bomb blast victims. The Orchid ALM Trust, which conducts best ALM contest in Mumbai every year, has twice ranked the Diamond Garden Trust as the best ALM.

10) Save Bombay Committee

Founded by Kisan Mehta, the Save Bombay Committee (SBC), an NGO registered in 1973, has been agitating for improving the quality of life. It has taken up major issues both at national and local levels. SBC has provided guidelines to governments on developing viable programmes. Some of the issues that SBC has been working for include conservation of the finite natural resources, rehabilitation of slums, decongestion of human settlements, ensuring minimum standards of public health, pedestrian oriented sustainable public transport, appropriate management of solid and liquid waste and reduction of waste, safe treatment and discharge of waste water, elimination of toxic substances in private and public life and so on. Over a period of time, the activities of SBC have extended from Mumbai in India to different parts of the country. Currently volunteers based in different parts of the world take up issues that have global relevance.