Youngsters take it upon themselves to clean lakes

Boduppal: Self-help is the best help, so goes the saying. The members of 'Helping Hands Humanity,' an NGO-based organisation in the Eastern part of the city, have been cleaning two lakes, namely Raa Cheruvu aka Rama Cheruvu at Ambedkar Nagar in Boduppal and Annarayani Cheruvu at Keesara.

Prashanth, a member of Helping Hands Humanity said, "The members spend their weekend by collecting plastic waste and clearing the trash from the lakes. We are also organising various awareness campaigns among the locals to save the lake. We also organise campaigns against throwing garbage in the water bodies"

Thanks to the efforts, residents now think twice before throwing garbage into the lake. From the past four years we are working for the protection of the 8-acre Annarayani Cheruvu, and 10 acre Rama Cheruvu.

We have cleaned the surrounding of the lake but we have asked the HMDA and Nagaram Municipality for desiltation and also to construct an STP but there is no response yet.

Fed up by lodging complaints to the concerned officials, the NGO has taken it upon itself to clean the lake. More than 30 volunteers from various colleges participate in this drive.

Apart from the cleanliness drive, the NGO organizes various awareness programmes to sensitise the locals about the ill-effects of water pollution. This NGO began in 2012 to protect various water bodies and also helps the government school children by distributing books. The NGO is run by crowd funding.