Green Pune: activists,citizens take musical pledge

Among them were industrialist Abhay Firodia,former mayor Vandana Chavan,and environmentalists like Aneeta Benninger and Sujit Patwardhan among others. Musicians Vineet Alurkar and Bhupal Limaye sang some songs followed by the theme song,specially composed for the occasion.

“According to the United Nations,we need about 12 square metres of leaf surface per person to absorb carbon and the tree trunks to store it. So,a forest of 12 square metres per person is what we need to create. There are 35 lakh Punekars today so we need 4200 hectares or 10,000 acres of forest. Currently,there is a shortfall of 3000 acres. The proposed biodiversity parks (BDP) will bring in an additional 2100 acres so we will more or less meet our current need. We have to plan for the future generations,” activist Satish Khot of National Society for Clean Cities said.

“Over 500 people took a unique musical pledge to work for bringing the atmospheric carbon to safe limits. The song was written by an eminent artist Shrirang Godbole,” Khot said.

A resource kit for teachers on environment matters written by Subbalaxmi Kumar was released by Dr Jayashree Firodia.