UDUPI: Four Class 8 students from Morarji Desai Residential School in Bramhavar, inspired by an awareness talk on pollution and environment by their mathematics teacher, launched a drive and collected 4,000 waste plastic disposable pens.
“I was surprised when four students — Pooja, Sanjana, Harshith and Rakesh — approached me on Saturday with a trunk full of used plastic pens. They had meticulously collected discarded use and throw pens from each of the 400 students from the school during the last five months and kept them in one of the trunks allotted to them. They handed it over to me with a lot of hope that it would be recycled,” mathematics teacher Santhosh Kodi told TOI. Santhosh is a beach cleaning volunteer of the Clean Kundapura Project.
Unlike in the past, today, students use only disposable plastic pens that are cheap. During our beach cleaning drives, we have noticed that plastic pens lead to a huge accumulation of waste, affecting the environment in a big way, he said.
“About five months ago, I had explained to the students about the hazards of disposable plastic pens on the environment. I was surprised and touched when these four students took my words seriously and collected an average of 10 used pens from each student on their own and handed them over to me for disposal. The plastic used is of good quality and can be recycled. We will approach the Solid Liquid Resource Management (SLRM) unit and TIP sessions, a climate action NGO into waste management and see if they will accept these pens and help us in recycling,” said Santhosh.
The work of the children has been brought to the notice of higher officials. “I am also surprised that the post I have written on Facebook about the students’ initiative has gone viral. We have been receiving a positive response,” he said.
