Keep up the spirit: City students clean up Juhu beach

The Ganpati celebrations are over and so is the festive fervour at Mumbai’s beaches. What’s left is debris of idols laid strewn across the sand, and a lot of trash, including plastic bags, disposed bottles, etc. In a bid to give back to society, many people, including celebs, like Anupam Kher and Parineeti Chopra, have been doing their bit to clean up the beaches. Joining the bandwagon was a group of students from a city college who spent over five hours cleaning Juhu beach over the weekend.

“Besides us, there were a lot of other people who engaged in beach-cleaning activities. It shows how so many people care for our environment,” says Shavarni Shukla, a postgraduate fashion communication student at Pearl Academy, Mumbai. Another student, Maansi Sharma, feels that the post-festival cleaning is as important as celebrating the festival. “As Mumbaikars, we celebrate Ganesh visarjan will full excitement. So, we should be equally enthusiastic about cleaning the litter too; it’s our responsibility,” she says.

For undergraduate student Sharanyaa Nair, it’s more to do with leading by example. She explains, “It is easy to be vocal about environmental problems, but very few walk the talk. The beach clean-up was an eye-opener for me; the experience redefined that actions speak louder than words.”

“Cleaning the beach was a wholesome experience. We saw it as something fun, not tiresome,” says Surabhi Kabra, an undergraduate media student.

Sharing why they decided to organise such an initiative, Sonika Tewari, department lead, Pearl Academy, Mumbai, says, “We want our students to be aware of their social responsibilities and take steps towards making the environment sustainable. The Juhu beach clean-up was a step in that direction. These students are the future of our country. We have a curriculum on sustainable lifestyle and corporate social responsibility, and we wanted the students to have a practical experience of that.”