A Bengaluru-based activist group, which is on a mission to clear the city roads of cigarette butts, have collected 4 kg of cigarette butts while cleaning the area from Anand Rao circle to Church Street.
According to a Bangalore Mirror report, activists of Yeshwantpur-based Karnataka Swaraj Jan Sanghatan(KSJS) believe that cigarette butts of any size are toxic and contain non-biodegradable materials.
They have been patrolling important areas in the city and collecting cigarette butts from the streets.
BM reported that on Friday activists of KSJS started their mission of collecting butts from streets of Anand Rao circle area up to Church Street. The collection of cigarette butts was given to Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB).
BM quoted M Mahesh of KSJS, saying, "More than any other garbage, it is cigarette butts that cause the worst damage to the environment. Not only humans but even animals and birds get affected by this. Left on the streets, it takes more than 12 years to decompose and during rains it just gets washed away, choking drains. The butt has several toxic chemicals that get mixed with the soil, making it toxic and contaminated. Western countries are aware about the ill-effects and order cigarette manufacturing companies to take care of butts. But in India, it is a tragedy that nobody is aware of the ill effects of butts."
Four kg of cigarette butts were collected from Anand Rao Circle, Race Course Road, Chalukya Circle, MS Building, Ambedkar Veedhi, Cubbon Park and MG Road.
BM quoted Krishna, an activist, saying, "Central Bengaluru alone produces over 10 quintals of cigarette butts everyday. 99 per cent of this is either strewn along the streets or thrown into the drain. Sometimes, birds end up eating them and getting infected by the toxic substance. The government must direct cigarette manufacturing companies to take up the responsibility of collecting and recycling of butts."
This is an aggregated report from Bangalore Mirror
Image courtesy: By Dick Rochester from Lafayette, Colorado, United States (black and mucus filled lungs nearby) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons