Chitlapakkam locals add green to city’s landscape

Chitlapakkam locals add green to city’s landscape

Srikkanth.D@timesgroup.com

Chennai:3.8.2021

At a time whenGreater Chennai Corporation is inviting resident welfare associations to collaborate with it in increasing the city’s green cover, residents of Chitlapakkam, just outside the corporation limits, have taken it upon themselves to help increase lung space in their town panchayat limits.

Last weekend, residents organised a seedball-throwing party at Pachamalai hills near Tambaram to add more green to the city’s landscape.

“We had organized a similar event in September 2019 just before the monsoon. We sourced seed balls from an NGO and threw more than 3,000 seed balls at that time. Due to the onset of pandemic in early 2020, we were not able to continue the seedball-throwing event last year, but have resumed it this year,” said Sunil Jayaraman of Chitlapakkam Rising, a community movement.

The hill is a catchment area and source for the Chitlapakkam lake's rainwater. Considering the citizen movement in Chitlapakkam began with saving the waterbody, it has come as a natural extension to ensure that the catchment area is also well maintained.

“It is an important step for the survival of the lake which we have revived after a public movement,” said Sunil Jayaraman.

Last weekend, about 300 seedballs of native tree varieties such as Pungai and Poovarasu were thrown down the hill by volunteers.

For the seed-ball throwing event, more than 20 people, including kids, hiked the hills on Saturday and Sunday to participate in the event. Apart from increasing the urban lung space, the community movement also acts as a good physical exercise for kids and adults alike.

“While hiking down the hill, residents also collected plastic waste strewn along by visitors. The hill has a good view point and attracts a lot of visitors. But some of them leave behind plastic water bottles and litter which can be avoided,” said a resident.

Apart from this, as part of the ‘Green Chitlapakkam’ initiative, residents have, over the years, planted more than 1,000 saplings in town panchayats, including three urban forests, using the Miyawaki method.

“Now, another set of 100 saplings is ready and will be planted in the next three months,” Sunil said.