KOHIMA — Hundreds of students and police personnel on Tuesday volunteered in picking up wrappers and trashes littering the roads and pavements in and around the Police Headquarters (PHQ) Junction in Kohima.
The cleanliness drive was organised by a group of concerned citizens called 'KAM,' which literally means work, with an objective to make 'clean and green Nagaland'. Students from Dainty Buds School and Ministers' Hill Baptist Higher Secondary School and the state police carried out the cleanliness drive.
Mengu Soukhrie, who is a part of KAM, said that they are involving students as they are young. She was hopeful that starting the habit of cleanliness among the youngsters would help in the long run. She said her main focus was to spread awareness of doing away with the litterbugs and to stop spitting in public places.
She expressed hope that such activities by the students could correct the present generation and older generations, who never thought that littering is a punishable offence. She believed that Nagaland would one day uphold the rules and be able to check who is littering and spoiling the land.
"I just want to see Nagaland clean and green," Soukhrie said.
[bsa_pro_ad_space id=1]She further pointed out that cleanliness drive is all about tourism in a way and added it is a shame to show dirty streets and drainage of the city to the visitors. Informing that similar drives would be conducted in the future, she said anybody could volunteer in the activities.
With the commencement of cleaner and greener Kohima initiated by KAM, MLA Dr. Tseilhoutuo Rhutso informed that the team would try to conduct such activities every month. He told the people gathered to educate oneself with the mentality of what they could contribute to society and not what they could get from it.
He further encouraged all to remember that they save someone from injury every time they pick up a sharp object (trash). He also said that if one wants to promote the nation, 'it is only possible by empowering women and treating women as equal to men.'
The Additional Director General of Police (Law and Order), Sandeep Tamgadge, said that Kohima being the state capital should be the mirror for the people. He added that the government of India is trying to project the Swachh Bharat Mission starting with the children.
Tamgadge was of the opinion that ‘if one keeps their home clean, there is no reason why they should litter outside their home,’ and informed that starting today the cleanliness drive would continue.
The KAM’s cleanliness drive is an initiative for clean and green Nagaland supported by the Tourism Department.