This goes back to the year 2010. Living in the City of Joy, Kolkata, it was indeed a matter of joy and more so when the entire city used to light up and tap its feet to the stirring sound of the
dhak during Durga Puja. Small young girls beautifully clad in white sarees with bright red borders was a fond sight to behold! After all, I too was one such girl.
Sans defying our traditional requisites, on the eve of Durgastami (the seventh day of Navratri) my parents and I went pandal hopping. As we went from one pandal to another, amazed by the artistic designs and the booming zeal of the crowd, we were caught in the rhythm the city had. However, near one pandal we came across this group of children who looked a tad bit out of place. Amongst all the decked up people around them they were busy fidgeting with the garbage bins around all the eateries. Looking at the children who were more or less of the same age as her daughter, my mother went forward to enquire. It had so happened that the children were from a nearby town called Sonarpur and had come to collect large volumes of cold drink cans which were discarded abundantly used during the festival. My inquisitiveness dawned on me and the immediate chain of thought lead me to recyclability. My mind pondered back to the environment class I had in my school the other day. Unlike some other schools, we were actually made to design and do some ground work of our taught learnings. I owe my holistic development to my alma mater- G. D. Birla Centre for Education and perhaps that explains my soft corner towards ‘Birla’ in general. Hold on. But the question was why were these children asked to collect these, given the unhealthy aspect of this whole activity? So I immediately went and spoke to them about the harmful impact of what they were indulging in and how different it is from what they should actually be doing in their lives, while my parents kept looking at me in silent awe. In the midst of my little deliberation, it was clear to my parents and me what I really wanted to do in my life. We contacted the cops who were stationed there for patrolling duty and asked them to take due care of such activities too. Since then I have been actively involved with various organizations including the World Youth Council to empower the young children of this country, doing ground work in cities like Kolkata, Bangalore, Bhubaneswar etc.
What amazes me most about that incident that day is how important a thing of recyclability can be! And guess who is the biggest recycler of aluminum cans in the world. It’s none other than – Aditya Birla Group. Their contribution to the society cannot be gauged in numbers. It goes way beyond that. From heading one of the biggest apparel chains in the country to becoming the world’s 2
ndlargest in the telecom sector. The have repeatedly proven themselves in quality and customer welfare time and again. Like for example, the first place a student joining a MBA institute would go to buy his/her suits and formal wear would undoubtedly be a product of the ABG group. Well, that’s ABG in my life!