You’ve got mail, to plant trees Chitra Unnithan | TNN Ahmedabad: Instead of delivering impassioned speeches, a primary school teacher from Sabarkantha has developed a unique idea to make people plant trees. Every time an obituary appears in the newspaper, Rambhai Charan (51) sends a letter of condolence and requests the bereaved family to plant a tree in memory of the departed soul. Similarly, if he sees a marriage or birthday announcement in the local newspaper, he sends a congratulation note to request them to plant a tree on this happy occasion instead of any wasteful expenditure. So far, Rambhai has sent more than 40,000 letters in Gujarati since 1985, enlarging his realm of responsibility towards strangers. “My sons call me a ‘hartu-fartu paryavaran’. I write at least five letters every day and have devoted my life to the cause of environment,” said Rambhai, who plans to spend his retirement life by planting trees, instead of farming, in his seven acres of land. This unusual interest was developed during childhood in his native village Kuava. Once Rambhai went to his neighbour’s farm to pluck mangoes and was forbidden to eat the fruit. He then decided to sow his own mango seeds and not eat mango from anywhere else. For three summers, he nursed his plants with water ferried from afar. And then nature sent him a feedback. That day onwards, Rambhai chose a variety of plants plucked from the wild and let nature take its course. While studying masters at Gujarat Vidyapith, Rambhai set himself a target of planting 100 trees a month and decided to try this innovative method to get people to plant trees. Out of the thousands of letters every month, Rambhai has preserved about 100 letters sent as reply to him on this novel concept. Even during the current mobile phone generation, Rambhai continues to make an impact through postcards. “The post office at Himmatnagar gives me about 300 cards when they see me. Postcard message can be passed on to many people unlike a mobile phone, where I can only speak to one person, who may or not listen to my advice,” said Rambhai, whose innovation has been documented by Ahmedabadbased environmental and social development organization — SRISTI. In December, 2009 Rambhai was honoured at SRISTI Sanman function. Besides ordinary people, Rambhai writes personal letters to public figures including the state government. “I write to chief minister Narendra Modi every year on his birthday and sometimes he sends a personalized reply in his handwriting that he is working towards the cause,” said Rambhai who showed his compassion for nature by removing ceiling fans after birds created nests inside his house.
Posted on: Wed, 05 Jun 2013 03:16:19 +0000
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