Earth Hour, A token, A symbol, which needs to be carried forward

Couple of days back, we had a very novel idea implemented throughout the world – Earth Hour. Everyone was requested to switch off electrical appliances, which most of us did. While watching the news related to this, I thought we have made AN EVENT out of it. Why otherwise having (or to be precise not having) Abhishek Bacchan’s video in the so called program is creating news? Anyways, people can create news out of anything, here; I wanted to talk about something else.

What is this Earth hour? And why are we talking about this?
We all know that our environment is facing biggest threat - climate change. (And it’s not only environment, but in turn all of us on Earth).
We already had Copenhagen conference where all the global leaders discussed how to control global warming, carbon emissions etc. (Unfortunately, Its outcome is subject of controversy and can be a subject of another article.) And why go on global stage - in our Persistent we have (?) Green Persistent movement is in progress. This means there is increasing level of awareness at every level about the environmental cause.
As per Wikipedia, Earth hour is organized to increase public AWARENESS about global warming and it is global call of action to every individual, business, school and community to take a stand against climate change. This necessarily means it’s a token, a symbol which is asking for more action from all of us.

So what can me - as an individual can do for this global cause. (I know that we have already gone through such appeals, and how we react to them. I don’t want to blame anyone, but we tend treat them as “GOOD TO HAVE FEATURES” and never make them “PRIORITY ITEMS” .

So here are few simple things which I tried to follow,
1. Never ever take a receipt of printed transaction on ATM unless you really need them. (Or you are keeping them in your daily account summary, and I am sure no one is doing it!!!)
I previously used to take them, have a look at them for few seconds and then throw them away. The information on this receipt was remaining balance, which I could have easily checked on screen of ATM machine. So basically I never needed them, but was printing them just as a habit. Once I stopped printing them, I tried observing people around me in ATM and the result wasn’t much different, almost everyone was doing same.
2. A colleague of mine has an Email tagline “Please consider the impact to the environment before printing this email”. This, although looks small, but consider around 10 lakh IT employees in India, if they fire even a single unnecessary print then its waste of 10 lakh pages.
3. Switching off unnecessary lights (I don’t think we even need to say this, this needs to be DEFAULT condition programmed in our brain)
4. I understand that machines take time in startup, but this doesn’t mean that I should never shut them down. I know many of us tend to just lock the machine and leave for the day. And while doing so we think, what will happen due my SINGLE machine. Here again consider its not only me or you, remember the number around 10 lakh!!!

This list can be never ending, we can find as many ways as we like, it’s just of our will. And of course we need to remember that earth hour is one of the initiatives to increase our will, our awareness, it’s just a token, a symbol, which we need to carry forward in our everyday life.

गाभ्रीचा पाऊस

पाऊस!! पावसाचा आणि माझा एकमेकांशी संबंध तरी किती, एक सोपा निबंधाचा विषय म्हणून, काही प्रसिद्ध कवितांचा विषय म्हणून, वाफाळलेल्या चहाबरोबर - गप्पा मारत खाल्लेल्या भज्यांचा सोबती म्हणून का ओल्याचिंब नायिकेला न्याहाळताना दुर्लीक्षिलेला म्हणून.. शहरात जन्मलेल्या मला आणि माझ्यासारख्या बहुसंख्य जणांना पाऊस भेटतो तो फक्त असाच. त्याचे माझ्या आयुष्यातील महत्त्व ते किती - नगण्य, कारण तो नाही आला तरी माझ्या आयुष्यात काही फार मोठा फरक पडणार नसतो. परंतु शेतकऱ्याचा आयुष्यात....... तिथे मात्र हा आपला प्रेमळ शहरी मित्र, एका कधीही न सुटणाऱ्या यक्ष प्रश्नाच्या रुपात समोर येतो.

गाभ्रीचा पाऊस हा असाच एका शेतकऱ्याचा, त्याच्या आणि पावसाच्या लपंडावाचा, त्याच्या कुटुंबाच्या प्रतिक्रियांचा चित्रपट आहे. या चित्रपटाला विदर्भात होणाऱ्या आत्महत्यांची पार्श्वभूमी आहे. चित्रपट सुरु होतो, तोच मुळी एका आत्महत्या केलेल्या शेतकऱ्याचा घरात. नायिका मृत व्यक्तीच्या पत्नीचे सांत्वन करण्याचा प्रयत्न करत आहे, पण खरेतर तीच मनातून खचली आहे, कदाचित माझा पतीपण!! नायिका हि चिंता आपल्या सासूला सांगते, आणि मग सुरु होतं नायिकेचे कायम आपल्या पतीवर लक्ष ठेवणं. तिचे कायम आपल्या मुलाला त्याच्यासोबत पाठवणं, उधारीने खरेदी करून त्याला पुरणपोळी करून खायला घालण, आणि अशाच काही प्रकारे आपला पती कायम आनंदात राहील याचा प्रयत्न करणं. चित्रपटाच्या एका दृश्यात या दाम्पत्याचा मुलगा मयतीवर फेकेलेले एक रुपयाचे नाणं उचलतो, आणि नायक त्याला फटकावून ते फेकून देतो. नायिका सर्व प्रकारे आपल्या नायकाला मदत करण्याच्या प्रयत्नात असताना, नायक मात्र एका विवंचनेत पुरता फसलेलो असतो. तो कधी टीवीवर पावसाचे अंदाज बघत असतो, कधी शेतावर पेरणी करण्यासाठी बैल कुठे भाड्याने मिळतात का ते शोधात असतो, कधी त्याला बियाण्यासाठी लागणारे पैसे कुठून येणार याची चिंता असते, तर कधी मोटार लावून पाणी खेचण्यासाठी वीज कधी येणार याची काळजी असते. ग्रामीण जीवनाच्या दाहक वास्तवतेला स्पर्श करत चित्रपट पुढे सरकतो. आणि चित्रपटाच्या शेवटच्या फ्रेममध्ये आपल्याला दिसतं मयतीवर फेकेलेले एक नाणं. अनेक प्रश्न अनुत्तरीत ठेवून चित्रपट संपतो.

एखाद्या सामाजिक विषयाबद्दल जन- जागृती करण्यासाठी चित्रपट या माध्यमाचा किती प्रभावीपणे उपयोग करता येतो याचा प्रत्यय चित्रपटाच्या प्रत्येक फ्रेममध्ये येतो. गाभ्रीचा पाऊस या चित्रपटाने एका अत्यंत गंभीर विषयाला वाचा फोडली आहे. कलेचा अविष्कार हा फक्त औट घटकेच्या करमणुकीसाठी नसतो, हेच हा चित्रपट सांगत आहे.

आपल्या अन्नदात्याच्या, शेतकऱ्याच्या जीवनातले यक्ष प्रश्न चित्रपटाने आपल्याला विचारले आहेत. ते सोडवणे हि प्रशासनाबरोबरच आपलीही जवाबदारी आहे. मला माहित आहे, कि प्रत्येक जण प्रत्यक्षपणे जाऊन प्रश्न सोडवू शकणार नाही, परंतु ते समजून घेऊन, त्यांच्याविषयी आपण कृतज्ञता तर नक्कीच करू शकतो. तेवढे कृतघ्न तर आपण नक्कीच नाही!!!

Do I really need it?

Do I really need it? I don’t know. (Or rather I know but I am not ready to admit it!!!)

Recently I was watching a movie named Confessions of shopoholic. The movie is a about a girl who is addict to buying anything that she could see in the stores. The movie, as the name suggests, is about her addiction buying unnecessary things. A friend of our heroine sends her to some clinic where experts try to help addict people. The counsellor asks a question to all people “Do you really need it?” and then asks everyone to repeat the question – Do I really need it? Do I really need it? Do I really need it? And it goes on and on.. I don’t know what happens next in the movie as I left it there and moved on to another channel.


After few days this question suddenly came to mind, Do I really need this? And although I am not shopoholic, I was left contemplating about the question for lot of time, and hence here I am writing about this.


I think I am not a potato couch, but very often I have found myself browsing channels just for the sake of it. When I reach home from office, I don’t want to do anything, absolutely anything, so I choose to switch on the TV. And I end up flipping through channels at a rate one channel per ten seconds. Do I really need it? Don’t I know the answer of this question? I know, but I am not ready to admit it.
This flipping continues till I find something worth(?) watching. And it is even more intersting to know what is that worthy channel that I am selecting. Most of the times, it is the movie which I have seen already. If I start counting, I will definitely find that there are many movies which I have seen more than ten times and I know each and every dialog, each and every frame. Is this activity called as entertainment? I know its not, but I don’t have the courage to admit it. Recently, I saw a movie named Condenmed on Star Movies. By the time the movie finished, I was cursing myself, why the hell I am watching this. And this is not the first time it happened to me, I have watched most insane movies like Anjaam, Singh is King. And this not only happens with movies, it continues with news also. I always think that I should be aware of whats happening around me. So what do I watch at news? Take yesterdays example, I was watching a debate over Sania Mirza – Shoiab Malik marriage. So called socialists were analyzing the issue(?) with so much of sincerity, there was also a psychologist who was analyzing behaviour of Shoaib Malik in press conference. And everyone will be amazed to know his deductions. They were able to deduct that Shoaib Malik was hiding something, this dedcution was based on the evidence – which was – Shoaib scratching his head, he being not ready to look into the camera….. and the argument goes on. Do I really need to watch this? I was able to answer the question this time, I immediately swiched off the TV.


My tryst with this question continues to many things that I do in my day. Take the example of browsing, which I know most of us are very fond of. What do I browse, first I go on Orkut, check all the scraps. Oops while writing this, I am stunned to type in the word SCRAP. Doesn’t it mean an old, discarded, or rejected item or substance? (courtsey : Dictionary.com) I think, the term is very correctly coined by Google engineers. Next I check my friend list on Orkut and on FaceBook. Then I find out how many on Orkut friend list are not on FaceBook friend list and vice-versa. Then I start sending requests to all of them!!! Waw, what a important task, isn’t it? Do I really need it? I think,no, I don’t need it. I can very well connect to all my loved once with one of these J. But I don’t know where to stop. I think, I am using computer, but it’s the other way round, the computer is using me.


Let me just traverse back in time and find out what I was doing without these exciting(?) gadgets – TV and computer. It was my eleventh standard. We had bought new house and shifted to new place. The place was then on outskitrts of city, our society was in secluded area. So there was no cable provider!!! (And Tata Sky wasn’t even born!!) I think, this is the year when I watched least amount of TV. Generally, people prepare for IITs and similar stuff, but I wasn’t doing anything of that sort. So I had ample time. I remember, I used to see Sun rising every day in the morning, this continued for the complete year, I even saw movement in the place where Sun rises on the horizon. It moved from one conrner of the east to other during the year. We had lots of rose plants in our balcony, red, yellow, white, pink, and the one which had two colours, pink and white. I used to water them all. It was the most a pleasant experience to see plants bud. Radio Mirchi was newly introduced in the Pune city. Saathiya was a chartbuster then,I remember myself waiting for Saathiya title track to be aired on the top 20 list. If I want to sum up everything in one sentence, it was the best time. Then slowly the place became crowded, cable providers came. Now I had TV remote, computer to play with. And by the time I reached second year of my engineering, all the rose plants died because I had no time to look at them. Currently, I don’t have any plant in my house.

Anyway, I know I have diverted the topic from where it started. So coming back again.

This list of places where I can ask the question “Do I need it?” can grow forever, I believe we all will have some or the other addiction like this. And of course no-one will admit it. And hence I’ve started loving this question – “Do I really need it?” More often I ask it to myself, more time I will get to the things that I love doing most.