Faridabad MC offers cash prize for anti-plastic drive by school kids

Bijendra Ahlawat

Tribune News Service

Faridabad, September 20

To motivate and involve school students in the anti-plastic drive, the Municipal Corporation Faridabad (MCF) has announced a cash prize scheme through an inter- school competition launched for the first time.

“The civic body plans to provide cash rewards to those students and schools which achieve top three positions in the competition related to collection of highest number of plastic items like used food packets, plastic bottles and polybags disposed daily’’ said a senior official of the MCF. He also said the District Education Officer(DEO) had already been asked to inform all schools in the city regarding the competition launched under the drive aimed at curbing improper disposal of plastic items .

The competition will come to an end on September 29.Claiming that while the usage of plastic and polythene is hard to be banned under the present conditions, officials said lakhs of plastic pouches of milk and other products find their way to the drains and in open areas daily, which choke sewerage lines and drains, besides polluting the environment in one form or another.

According to the scheme, the civic body will give a cash prize to the top three position holders. The winners will be selected among students individually and the schools. While the first prize will be of Rs 21,000,the second and third prizes will be of Rs 11,000 and Rs 5,100 respectively. Besides the winners, the teachers guiding or helping the students and schools in this competition will also be honoured with certificates. The prizes have been sponsored by two NGOs named Mahavir International Social Foundation and Eduworld, it is claimed.

“Though this competition has been launched on a trial basis, its success could result in extending the competition to colleges and the Residents WelfareAssociations (RWA),” says Inderjit Kulharia, Additional Commissioner, MCF, who claimed that the idea was to create awareness and motivate the residents for proper disposal of plastic items to make the city clean and environment friendly.