He is traveling 6000 kms over 124 days. He will visit colleges and schools on the way, and sensitize people on the environment. He will fight consumerism, especially by not being a conspicuous consumer himself. He will spend less, live simple, and just ride the bicycle moving from one district to another.
Meet 30-year old Bharathi Kannan of Tambaram Nanbaragal, who has travelled to all the districts of Tamil Nadu to sensitize people about environmental issues.
He started his journey from Chennai on February 6, 2016 and will be returning on December 24, 2016. “I visited about 50 schools and colleges to sensitize students about the issues we are facing nowadays. I also met farmers, women groups and youth organizations,” he said.
What was the main aim behind this journey? “All the environmental issues are inter-connected. The main aim is to fight consumerism. The whole lifestyle of consumerism has badly affected all of us. The floods were because of greed, we have polluted all the rivers by using plastic and industrial waste. We are creating threats for ourselves by doing this,” he said.
And these are not just empty statements – he practices what he preaches, “I decided not to buy water, not to use multi-national corporation products, not to use English medicines and also not to pay and stay in hotels. Some nights I lived on seashores and mandapams.”
He had friends to accompany on his journey on weekends. “We used to speak to people about the environmental issues. We used to make children understand how our land and water-bodies need to be protected from pollution,” he said.
The whole experience, he said, was extraordinary, “I met many people, environmentalists, teachers and also visited many places where there were environmental issues like Enayam in Kanyakumari. I also went to Kudankulam and saw how people are still getting affected,” he said.
What next? “We have identified many youngsters and schools with whom we can work together on these issues. In Schools, we will start by making them subscribe to vernacular journals on environmental issues,” he said.