PEC organises workshop on SWM under its ‘Catch Them Young’ campaign.

SRINAGAR, SEPTEMBER,01 :
Srinagar: Under its “Catch Them Young” campaign, the Peoples’ Environmental Council (PEC)
organized a workshop on Thursday for the students of Hanfi Model Institute, a private school at Tazipora
in south Kashmir’s Kulgam district.
The campaign, supported by the Islamic University of Science and Technology (IUST), aims to prepare
young students for environmental leadership. In the past three months, PEC has already organized
programmes in Srinagar and Baramullah districts.
“The primary objective for this activity was to understand the solid waste management (SWM) process
and visit the waste dumping site in the Kulgam district (At Mirhama Kulgam),” PEC said in a statement.
The schoolchildren along with experts of PEC visited the waste dumping site and discovered that it is
situated in close proximity to the freshwater stream, Veshove River, the statement added. “The water
from this stream is utilized for domestic purposes downstream. Regrettably, the dumping site remains
completely exposed without any technical measures in place to ensure its safety. This has led to a
significant increase in water pollution, posing a severe threat to public health,” the statement said.
According to the statement, the school children were subsequently taken to the source of this water
stream, Aharbal Falls where they observed that the water is exceptionally clean.
“However, as it flows downstream, it becomes increasingly contaminated as it passes through different
villages, and towns including waste dumping site, the statement said added that additional educational
activities were also organized for schoolchildren focusing on their understanding of waste management
and the issues associated with Kashmir’s current waste management system, particularly the
mismanagement of dumping sites. As per the statement, school children finally carried out a cleanliness
drive in Aharbal Park.
Quoting PEC’s chairman, Dr. Khurshid A Salman, the PEC statement said that the basic aim of exposing
the students to the practical side of environmental pollution “is to make students to see for themselves as
seeing is believing.” He was further quoted as saying that when the students are convinced about the
consequences of environmental pollution, it will motivate them “to think creatively about finding
solutions to environmental problems and become part of the process required for dealing with our
environmental challenges.”
“Helping students to take leadership roles is a must to deal with the environmental problems and climate
change,” the statement quoted him as saying adding that the PEC is planning a series of programmes