Anil Kumar, a resident of Enadi village, near Vaikom, cleans up the clogged Pullanthi river on his country boat.
| Photo Credit: VISHNU PRATHAP
Located in the backwater landscape of Kottayam, the village of Enadi still retains its old charm of fresh air and nature in abundance. However, the Pullanthi river that flows by the village offers a sharp contrast with accumulated garbage and weeds, blocking the way to Vembanad Lake.
Anil Kumar, a 52-year-old man who lives on the riverbank here, has set out to do his bit to clear the waste. Every morning, he sets sail on his country boat to the waterbody, a tributary of the Muvattupuzha river, to clean up the weed and waste with a sickle attached to a 10-metre-long pole.
“This river used to be a favourite thoroughfare for country boats,” he says. Then came the overwhelming tide of garbage flow and weed proliferation, which gradually converted this once picturesque stream into a trickle.
A wood contractor by profession, Mr. Kumar volunteered to clean up the river, the only direct access to his residence on a small islet called Cheruthuruth. A wooden bridge across the near 10-metre-wide stream, which offers connectivity to the world outside, cannot be used in emergency situations.
“Though the residents of our area approached the local administrative bodies at all levels with a request to clear the waterway, no funds have been made available for it. Against this backdrop, I decided to clean up the river on my own,” he explains.
Nearly three months into his mission, Mr. Kumar has cleared around 2 km of the river stretch. He is likely to clean up till the bridge connecting Enadi with Thuruthuthumma soon. And even as his work progresses slowly, he has inspired the villagers to constitute a people’s collective that has started cleaning the waterbody from the other end.
Mr. Kumar, who serves as chairman of the collective, joins the collective everyday after completing the restoration work marked for each morning.
“Several people have left our settlement and there are only about 15 families left here. A full-scale restoration of the waterway will benefit not just the local residents but hundreds of those living on both the banks of the river,” he adds.