October 2021
Read Coverting Letter – Rama’s squirrel calling …..
Dear Friends,
A 14-year-old Indian girl from Tamil Nadu Vinisha Umashankar spoke at the COP26 meet (Glasgow Climate Change Conference) where she mesmerised everyone with a powerful speech. Vinisha called for an urgent action on the climate front, saying that many of her generation are angry at world leaders. She said that she has no time for anger, as this was the time for action. Please listen her short 3.5 minute powerful speech https://youtu.be/CgKpxBKW-6o to get an inspiration to work for climate change in your own small way like a Rama’s squirrel as we are doing it at Rameswaram.
This month’s newsletter has the following highlights:
- Dr.Sanjay Banerji in his blog writes on – Land Use and Land Use Change and Forestry
- Shri.Rangarajan’s regular blog followed by Teertha yatra by 12 women from Madurai to the renovated Teerthas at Rameswaram.
- Regular Solid waste management work by – Hand in Hand Inclusive Development Services, Chennai
- Dr.A.Abirami, Programme Officer of the C.P.R. Environmental Educational Center writes about the herbal plant – Ivy Gourd
- Livelihood Opportunities – covers Pasumai group’s activities
- Revival and Renovation of Krishna Teertham – photo gallery
- In Social capital Teertha Pooja, Mass cleaning of water bodies, regular webinars and finally ‘Green Rameswaram newsletter’ by the students and for the students of Rameswaram
With best wishes,
Editorial Team
Green Rameswaram Project
Mahabeer Dharmasala
Rameswaram – 623526
Tamilnadu.
Ph: 04573 – 222296(office)
E-mail: greenrameswaram@gmail.com
Web: www.greenrameswaram.org
Newsletters
Land Use and Land Use Change and Forestry
Dear Friends,
We shall deal with reversing the GHG emissions from Land Use and Land Use Change in this month.
This is a very important but complex topic and is commonly abbreviated as LULUCF meaning Land Use and Land Use Change and Forestry. This forms one of the nine planetary boundaries. The Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has published a special report in January 2020 on the subject, and my blog is based primarily on this report [1]. I shall try to pick up only a small part of this comprehensive report for understanding the role of land in climate change.
A Rare book – Dhevaiula on Ramanathaswami
This classical work on Sri Ramanatha Swami of Rameswaram was composed by “Palapattadai Chokkanatha Pillai”. This work was discovered by Sri U.Ve.Saminatha Iyer after comparing multiple versions. He also wrote a commentary on this rare text.
I am attempting to provide a reasonable translation of this work, in English. This time, I am covering a few more Teerthams.
Solid Waste Management
Door-to-Door Collection and Garbage Segregation
Irrespective of the pandemic scenario, the green friends continued to serve the community and ensured cleanliness of Municipality. Door-to-Door waste collection and segregation along with street cleaning carried out uninterruptedly.
Herbal Garden (Muligai Vanam) Ivy Gourd
Distribution and Habitat
Coccinia grandis (L.) Voigtis a tropical plant in the Cucurbitaceae family. The plant is distributed in tropical Asia, Africa and is commonly found in Pakistan, India and Srilanka. It is a fast-growing perennial vine that grows several meters long. It can form dense mats on lands that readily cover shrubs and small trees. It is an outdoor plant but prefers a sunny sheltered position and a sandy soil. The roots and stems are succulent, tuberous and most likely facilitate the plant to survive prolonged drought. The tendrils are long, elastic with coil-like springy character that can wrap around the host to the entire length. Its leaves are arranged alternately along the stems; the shape of the leaves varies from heart to pentagon and size of the leaves is approximately 5 –10 cm. Flowers are large, white and star-shaped. The fruit is red, ovoid to elliptical, 25 – 60 mm long, 15 – 35 mm in diameter and contains several pale, flattened seeds.
“Revival and Renovation of Traditional Water Bodies” Krishna Teertham
We performed traditional pooja on 11th April, 2021 at Krishna Teertham site. However, because of the second wave of pandemic and the work of Parmeswara Teertham, we could not start the Revival and Renovation work until October 2021. Giving below the photo gallery of the work carried out in this month. We are sure of completing the work in the month of November.
“Livelihood Opportunities”
In the month of October we have added six new groups with 75 members. Thus by October end we have 116 groups with 1429 members.
Regular group meeting were held. The discussions were mainly on the following:
- Awareness Generation about Covid
- Awareness Generation about Vaccination
- Importance of exploring alternative fossil fuels
Social Capital
Teertha pooja
Regular Teertha pooja has been organized on full moon day of October 20th, 2021 at Agni Teertham and Kapi Teertham. This month we have started pooja at Parameswara Teertham also.
