Litter is a global issue that has raised eyebrows amongenvironmentalists. They’ve warned people about the disastrous consequences ofunmanaged garbage. In particular, the tourist places have been found gettingpolluted with trash that lots of unmindful tourists throw anywhere. What do welitter places with? Junk-food packets, cigarette butts, used soft drink/waterbottles/tetra packs/tins, chewing gum wrappers, broken glass and electricalequipment parts, polythene bags and wrappers, diapers, pads and so on make upthe litter that is thrown mercilessly at places that they don’t belong to.Overflowing dustbins and fast-food wrappers thrown out of moving cars are athing of worry, too. Littering has endangered our health and jeopardized,especially, the pristine tourist spots. At tourist resorts which are visited bythousands of people, littering has become a colossal problem to tackle. Thelitterbugs feel that cleanliness isn’t their responsibility; they behavecallously and litter their stuff wherever they like. We forget that when heapsof garbage collect at places, they not only make the area dirty but also themunicipalities have to spend huge amounts on clearing them when that moneycould be spent on developmental projects. Trash-throwing is illegal andaesthetically wrong.
There are several reasons for people to litter around: One,when some see a spot already littered, they take it as a garbage dumping placeand intentionally throw their trash there. Two, at construction projectsworkers’ lunchtime waste and the building waste—pieces of wood, metals,plastics, debris, carboard and paper—are another ‘rich’ source of garbage.Three, callousness and carelessness has developed a litter culture. Many peoplehave become lazy and are unwilling to dispose of their trash appropriately. Ithas been seen that people frequently throw their trash out of their kitchenwindows on the road or street, feeling that roads and streets are ‘sarkari’ asif the ‘sarkar’ was something extraneous to us. Four, people, by and large,litter in an “I don’t care” way. Moving cars throw chewing gum wrappers,bottles and other trash on the roadways and feel that somebody else would pickand clean them up. Five, the lack of adequate number of litterbins is alsoresponsible for littering. People feel that public litterbins are not enough totemporarily store the trash accumulated every day. Six, the poor management ofthe existing cans also leads to this worry. Animal scavengers and blowing windalso dislodges a lot of trash and scatter it around.
Littering has a terrible impact on our health andenvironment. It spreads diseases and pest-species. Broken glass, needles,blades and sharp items can cause physical injury. Throwing cigarette butts on aheap or a forest can cause huge damage to life and property. Littering on roadsand streets adversely affects our environment. The toxic materials or chemicalspollute water, land, soil and air. It becomes very difficult to walk thestreets where heaps of garbage are found, and scores of dogs assemble therelooking for their food. Passersby are intruders to them. They pounce on themand bite. Polythene litter has become a huge problem for both land and marinewildlife. The herbivores sea birds, turtles, dolphins, and fish have been founddead with plastic and cigarette buts in their stomach. Similarly, when domesticanimals like cow take polythene for food, they consume it which affects theirdigestive system and reduces their stomach capacity. Littering affects tourismalso. The littered place gives a shabby look and tourists tend to avoid theseareas.
The Amir Khusro-verse ‘gar fidaus bar-rue zamin ast/haminasto, hamin asto, hamin ast’ (originally said about Delhi) would mean little tothe alarmists in Kashmir because the ‘firdaus’ is fast losing its charm. Natureis being plundered and littered making the Switzerland of Asia one of thescared places now. Gone are the days when homemade eco-friendly snacks like”gunhar dogul”, “massala-roti” and “chanchanbale”, served in paper-rags, were (inour childhood) a fantasy. To our children, these things would appear icons ofour backwardness. COCOALISATION has brought them spicy junk-foods packed inattractive polythene packets which they feel are the signs of development andprogress. Therefore, one finds littering items mentioned above, scattered allaround tourist and non-tourist places. Here, littering is taken as a right asif Kashmir was a ‘sarkari’ place whose cleanliness was the responsibility ofthe Sarkar only. In 2016, WHO listed Srinagar as the tenth most-polluted cityin the world. It annoyed the Governmental agencies, but those who knew howdirty this city was admitted the report as correct. It was reported thatSrinagar had 113 micrograms per cubic metre of PM 2.5 concentration. A studyjointly conducted by Kashmir University and Institute of Tropical Meteorologyat Pune had found that the air quality of Srinagar was terribly low,surprisingly, in winters when Kashmir presents a pristine look. The study hadfound that, in dry weather, Srinagar air was worse than that of Delhi orKolkata. Unplanned colonization and urbanization, blocking of water channels,filling up of water-bodies and constructions coming up on the riverbanks hascreated immense problems. Rainwater flowing into our lakes and badly managedsewage-plants have endangered the existence of the Dal Lake and Wular Lake andthe Jhelum which are dying their own death. Mindless monolithic structures attourist places like Gulmarg, Pahalgam and Sonamarg have already told upon theirpristine glory.
Tourist resorts are littered as tourists take little care inusing litterbins. “Cleanliness is half the Faith”, that’s what we have beentaught. Let’s save Kashmir, in general, and the tourist spots, in particular,from turning into trash heaps. Litterbugs have made littering their hobby. Weneed to educate both local and nonlocal tourists about the disastrous impact oflittering. The Swach Bharat slogan has failed here. Laws are there, but theenforcing agencies are in slumber. Therefore, social awareness is necessary sothat we don’t become litterbugs. Nobody would want Kashmir to have Achins allaround!