At a time when water scarcity is affecting Bangalore city and 200 villages in the Kumudvati River belt, The Art of Living has launched the 'Kumudvathi River Rejuvenation Program', under the banner of its initiative 'Volunteer for a Better India' (VBI).
Since the launch of the 'Kumudvathi River Rejuvenation Program', over 2,000 volunteers have been working in villages, in and around the river basin, spearheaded by geological scientist Lingaraju Yale and his team. In the last month, volunteers have been working in the Nelamangala taluk in the river basin, in the villages of Kerekattegenoor, Arebommanahalli, T-Beguru, Srinivaspura, Yentaganahalli and Soldevanahalli. Work in this area includes cleanliness programmes; river rejuvenation awareness programme; survey and construction of perculation pits, small check dams; cleaning of small lakes; training panchayat development officers (PDO) of Nelamangala taluk regarding water; several meetings with CEO Bangalore Rural and other officials regarding implementation of project before monsoons; yoga and meditation courses for PDOs and members of gram panchayats of Nelmangala taluk to reduce stress; making villages plastic free through school children and garbage segregation as dry and wet waste with the help of village youth
Speaking on the programme, Lingaraja said, "The steps we need to take for this programme are village-level planning, integrations in micro and mini watersheds, bringing awareness among the farmers, preparation of action plan with gram panchayats, implementation of recharge structures, increasing vegetation cover, and motivating people to adopt horticultural plantation for water conservation."
We are hopeful that at the present drives by volunteers, in three years all villages in the Kumudvathi river basin will be free from water scarcity and the river itself will flourish as before."
