Republic Day Talk to Fellow Residents at Mantri Pride, Jayanagar, Bangalore, Jan 26, 2010

I wish to use this occasion to speak for a few minutes on some thoughts for us as an enlightened community. We have the education and resources that the average Indian may not have even in 2030. So, it is natural that we should aspire to act in a way that shows our sense of responsibility and culture. This day calls for such thinking.

We are so lucky – with a stadium and a big swimming pool nearby, not counting the small one close to Mantri Garden. We have Lal Bagh. We also have the Madhavan Park with a set of great trees that can be the envy of anyone living in the concrete jungles of Navi Mumbai or Noida. Can we do something as a community to preserve these treasures? For instance, can we prevent our end of the Madhavan Park from looking like a dump? Yes, we can. We can also prevent the gardeners from burning dried up leaves and dead branches and, thereby, reduce pollution. We can protect the great rain tree that stands in the little triangle on our way out to the Madhavan Park circle. We can do some shramdan to make that triangle look a little better.

On a more general note, we can get corporators and the local MLA to visit the building once in a while and meet us a community. We can give them one of those fine breakfasts that the Committee organizes for our own meetings. We need the elected representatives of the city to ensure that this area will not be allowed to run down.

Lastly there is one more point I wish to make. As an enlightened community, we can lead the city in reducing dirty and dangerous work for our fellow men. You would have seen three men on the garbage truck every morning, meticulously separating the garbage into multiple piles – plastic bags, glass items, metal items, kitchen waste and so on. Once in a while there will be broken glass and medical waste mixed up with all these. Can’t we separate our garbage into recyclables and biodegradable waste? We are all proud of the way this building collects recyclable paper and donates it to FAME. We were happy to see when garbage bags with different colors were distributed to enable separation of waste. It was a good attempt. If it did not work, we need not give up the effort; we can find a way that works. Let us separate recyclable material from our garbage. Let us show we care.

Thank you for listening.
Ramani