Versova beach rid of 3 lakh kg of solid waste

Versova beach has gotten rid of a massive 3.01 lakh kilogrammes of solid waste over the past eight months, thanks to an extensive residents movement known as Versova Resident Volunteers (VRV). Sadly though, as noted individuals from all walks of life including advocates, doctors, actors and businessmen have been regularly arriving at the beach on Sunday mornings to get their hands literally dirty, BMC contractors employed for the work have been irregular in showing up.

Regardless of the alleged indifference from the BMC, VRV now plans to make a documentary about the movement and do a presentation before the chief minister and civic higher officials to turn the movement into a sustainable programme of beach cleaning.

On Sunday, a VRV team comrising 125 volunteers collected a total of 14,500 kg of plastic waste and other solid trash from the beach. The team has been working on early mornings every weekend since the past nine months after the movement started on October 23, 2015. In its 33rd week, VRV has so far managed to clear the ocean of a massive 3,01,500 kg of plastic, synthetic waste, non-biodegradable material and even excreta.

As the team has steadily gained a large number of supporters since its inception, recent additions like actor Pooja Bedi, her daughter Aaliya Ibrahim, actors Karan Oberoi, Deepak Dobriyal and Shashi Ranjan have added more power to VRV’s efforts.

The BMC has awarded two contracts for beach cleaning — one for the northern side of the beach and another for the jetty side of the beach. On Sunday, the BMC provided two JCBs, a tractor and around 10 workers for work on the northern side of the beach. However, the contractor responsible for the Jetty side of the beach remained unavailable on Sunday. VRV members said help from the BMC has been irregular.

Elated by VRV’s achievement, Afroz Shah, co-founder and an advocate from Bombay high court, said that the entire journey has been a “dream run”. “Versova beach falls en-route to our society and I still remember October 23 when an 84-year-old resident of our society and I wore gloves and started cleaning the beach. Nine months on, the team has grown by leaps and bounds and the ocean is much clearer than it ever was,” said Mr Shah. gar